Complications
by practical cynicism
Summary: A new batch of students comes to Hogwarts because of a Dark wizard who destroyed their school. 2 girls are accepted by the marauders but one of them disrupts Lily and James’ relationship and a few friendships between the group change…
1. Of Bickerings and Banter

**AN –** continuation (some parts) of MLPP, u don't need 2 read that coz it's long…but I'd be really grateful if u do…

**Title: **Complications

**Summary: **if ur not illiterate then u must know already -_-

**Rating: **PG 13

**Dedication: **To Dianne, who died at the age of 12 on April 19, 2002 because she was too nice for this earth, to Alwyn, who is the best friend anybody could have, and to Steffi, coz even if we haven't kept in touch for years and there's a big chance that she won't get to read this, she'll always be a true friend to me. (There…now enough sap coz I am not…)

**Disclaimer: **Harry Potter and all recognizable stuff in this story belong to JK Rowling, Warner Bros, Scholastic Inc., the other publisher that I don't know the name of (sorry) and whoever else has the right to it. The plot and additional characters, spells and places are mine.

**AN again – **I just put that to make my fic look longer lol ^_^; review after u read plz…

Chapter 1: Of Bickerings and Banter 

BANG! BANG! (no this is not a gun^_^;) The constant thrashing on the door jolted Lily Evans out of bed.

"WAKE UP, FREAK!!!" Petunia's voice shouted through two inches of solid wood. With no response, she started knocking hard on the door again.

"GET—OUT—OF—BED—YOU—DOZING—DUMMY!!!" her sister yelled again, banging the door with each word uttered. Downstairs Lily heard the faint voice of their mother shouting, "Petunia Evans, do not use that language with your sister!" Lily could make out the muttered curses Petunia swore under her breath.

She smirked, knowing that her 'normal' sister always got reprimanded by their parents for speaking to Lily in harsh terms. It was what made her hate Lily in the first place…no, wait—being a witch was the first.

Hauling herself off the bed, she looked at the clock. 8:30. Time to prepare for her first day back to school.

"FREA—LILY!!! WAKE UP!!! OPEN THIS DOOR!!!"

Sighing, Lily opened her closet doors and started to get dressed. "Why don't you kick it open, horse face?" she yelled back over her sister's persistent pounding and shouting.

"MUM! LILY CALLED ME A HORSE FACE!!!" Petunia's footsteps reverberated through the narrow hall as she left her post outside Lily's door.

Lily opened her bedroom door just as Petunia went downstairs to their mum. She shrugged and followed her sister's path slowly. 

"'Morning, mum," Lily greeted as she entered the dining room. 

Her mother smiled, turning away from her pan at the stove. "Good morning, dear," she replied. "Your father left for work already, and I'll have to take you to the station. Want to come, Petunia?" she asked her other daughter.

Petunia was scowling. She probably was because their mum didn't call Lily on her name-calling. When Petunia was the one who talked rudely to Lily, she got an earful every single time. When _Lily _was the one who insulted her, she got away with everything… "No, I don't," she said stiffly.

Mrs. Evans shrugged. "Suit yourself," she said, turning around again to flip her pancakes. 

"Oh, mother, why don't we let Petunia come along? I'm sure she doesn't have anything else to do, and a trip out of the house would be good for her," Lily said, her voice oozing with sweetness. 

"Well then…if you want her to come along so badly… Petunia, get dressed. You're coming with us," Mrs. Evans confirmed. 

Petunia glared at Lily. Lily knew that Petunia never wanted to go anywhere that Lily was going, even more so at the station where there were a lot of _'her kind' _parading around with owls and black cats and gigantic trunks. It bothered Petunia even more that she was being forced into this against her own will, all because their mother favored Lily's decisions more than hers. 

Lily smirked at her sister before their mother laid fresh pancakes and a bottle of maple syrup in front of them. Yep, she was definitely going to miss her summer routine…especially the part when she got to pick on Petunia without expecting punishment.

***

The trip to the station was quiet, except for the brief moment where Lily and her mum chatted about the school curriculum (something which she knew Petunia would keep silent about) and the subjects she dropped since it was going to get more hectic with her O.W.L.'s coming up. When they reached King's Cross, the three Evanses walked (with Petunia sulking all the way) to the barrier between platforms nine and ten. Mrs. Evans hugged Lily.

"Take care, dear," was all she said, patting her daughter on the back. 

"Yeah, bye mum, bye Petunia," Lily said too, peering over her mum's shoulder at her sister and smirking. 

"Petunia? Aren't you going to say goodbye to your sister?" Mrs. Evans scolded.

Petunia scowled. "Good-bye," she said, rather forcefully. Under her breath she muttered, "And good riddance."

_"Petunia."_

"Sorry, mum." Petunia scowled again.

"Lil!"

Lily turned around to see who was calling her. A raven-haired boy with dark blue eyes (so dark they were almost black) was waving to her. She smiled and waved back.

Sirius ran over and gave her a light punch on the shoulder. "Hey Evans, why didn't you come to our annual meeting?" he asked her, looking slightly accusatory.

Lily laughed. "Sorry, but we had family plans. Where are the others?"

Sirius gestured at the crowd. "Got held up somewhere out there. Hey Mrs. E." His eyes fell on Petunia, whom he hadn't met yet since she always refused to accompany Lily to the station.

"Oh yeah, Siri, this is my sister Petunia, sis, this is Sirius Black," Lily said offhandedly. 

Petunia took Sirius' outstretched hand and shook it, staring at him with interest. Just like all girls, she seemed to be taken with Sirius' good looks.

Sirius flashed her a smile, his brilliantly white teeth showing. "A pleasure to meet you."

"Um, you too," Petunia said, blushing. Lily smirked.

"Mum, we have to leave now," Lily informed their mother. "C'mon, Sirius, we better get to the compartment before the others bombard it with hexes to greet us—"

"Don't fret, Lily, only moi can come up with the perfect curses to welcome you to the Hogwarts Express, so you have nothing to worry about," Sirius said arrogantly.

Lily elbowed him. "Cocky as always, aren't you?" she said, rolling her eyes.

"Yes, I am," Sirius deadpanned. They started to make for the barrier, but all their friends suddenly burst out of the crowd.

"Lil! Long time no see!" Celeste Schoharie, one of Lily's best friends and a new addition to their group just last year, exclaimed.

"Same here," Lily said with a laugh.

"You gotta help me here. I've had no other girl to talk to at Sirius' house than her, and I'm positive that I'm going to go crazy if I ever hear the word 'fashion' again," Chase Tarlise, Celeste's twin sister and Sirius' ex (the twins have last names because of a long story that I'm too lazy to explain now) told her.

"I missed you guys," Lily said, looking at their other friends assembled: Remus Lupin, a werewolf but the most mature among them (Celeste's BF); James Potter, one of the ringleaders of their group (her BF) and Peter Pettigrew, the scaredy-cat and mama's boy among the marauders (no one's BF).  All seven of them were the school's resident mischief-makers and prank aficionados. 

Despite the adults' warnings that they should enter through the barrier in pairs, they all burst in at once (with token protests form Peter, who gave in anyway), much to the alarm of the Muggles and the annoyance of the wizard guards standing just inside the barrier. They got away from an earful of disciplinary antics because the guards had to burst out and wipe the memories of the Muggles who had seen them. 

Boarding the Hogwarts Express at last, they settled into their compartment and waited for the train to leave.

"Gods, it's too early, we have thirty minutes before the train moves," Celeste said with a sigh.

"Ah, don't worry about her, she's just upset because her lack of beauty sleep gave her eye bags," Chase whispered to Lily, who chuckled. Celeste glared at Chase and kicked her shin.

"Ow! Why you vicious, overly-makeup-dosed miserable excuse for a twin sister! What the hell did you do that for?" Chase snapped at her, rubbing her tender shin where Celeste's three-inch heel had collided with.

"I do _not _have bags under my eyes!" Celeste cried, but despite her proclamation she extracted a hand mirror from her trunk and inspected her face anyway.

Chase snickered. "Prissy hypocritical freak."

"I'm not a freak!"

"OK guys, will you stop bickering already? We haven't even reached Hogwarts yet and you two are already on the point of spitting flames," Remus broke in, being a peacemaker as always.

"Chase, you are so insensitive," Celeste said haughtily before staring out the window, her only other option during discussions where she came off worse.

"Thanks, it's what I do," Chase replied with a sardonic smile. 

"So…what did you guys do at Sirius' house for the past week?" Lily said quickly, hoping to change the subject.

Sirius' eyes immediately brightened. "Oh, that! Wait'll you see all the new potions we invented after using up the remaining ingredients left over from our Potions homework! We know how to bottle undetectable spells now! We also—"

"Sirius, quit babbling. You sound like an idiot," James spoke up.

Sirius glared at him. "Hey, she was asking us something. It's called a detailed response. Look it up."

"Okay. Does anybody have a dictionary?" James called to them with a smirk.

"What else did you do?" Lily prompted. 

This time it was Remus who answered. "Traditionally, planned new pranks. There isn't really much interesting to tell, except the part where James, Sirius and Peter can now transform into animals at will."

Lily gasped. "What? Since when? Why didn't anybody tell me?" she demanded.

"Calm down, they only got it right two days ago. We figured that we could just tell you now, since we would be meeting, anyway." Chase was polishing the handle of her broom to pass the time. (She was one of Gryffindor's Chasers.)

"Yo Padfoot, there's no 'detailed response' listed here!" James called, waving a Webster's Dictionary over his head.

Sirius groaned. "That was a sarcastic response, you nitwit. You didn't have to—"

"Ah, here's one! **Detailed – **adjective; having many details or facts; showing attention to detail. **Response – **noun; a verbal or written answer."

"That's two not one," Chase said. Sirius shook his head in James' direction.

"But you taught them, right? How else could they learn it so fast?" Lily asked Chase eagerly, ignoring Sirius and James. Everyone in the room knew that Chase was also an Animagus and that she had been taught to be so by one of the seven Animagi at that century (not McGonagall -_-).

"Yep, a little, I guess…" Chase said, shrugging her shoulders before focusing her attention on her broomstick again.

"Let's see!" Lily said. 

"What, you want me to transform in here?! Do you have any idea how large a stag is?" James asked her.

"Fine, Peter, then."

Peter looked a little nervous. "Shouldn't we close the curtains and check if there's anybody outside looking in first?" he suggested apprehensively.

"Oh, sure," said James, who did just that in a flash. "The coast is clear," he announced after sticking his head out of the compartment door. 

"Okay," Peter squeaked with a gulp, and in a moment, he had transformed into a white rat on the seat.

"I'm surprised his Animagus form isn't a cat or a chicken," Sirius said offhandedly. James gave him a glare. He was the one who usually shielded Peter from all of Sirius' not-too-friendly remarks about him.

Lily clapped as Peter transformed back into a fifteen-year-old boy. "Wow, Pete. I have to say, I'm impressed that you could learn the transformation so quickly."

"Thanks," Peter answered, his ears going red.

"He needed all the help he could get," Sirius said. "Wanna see my transformation, Lil?"

"Can you fit in here if you transform, Sirius?" Remus said doubtfully. "I mean, you're hardly any smaller than James when you transform…"

"Don't worry about it. Lily wants to see—"

"A living Grim in our compartment," James finished with a laugh.

"Very funny. You sure go out of your way _not_ to act like a best friend, don't you?" Sirius said with a scowl.

"Well, why don't we test it? I'll pretend that you're my pet, and we'll parade around the train and count the people who _don't _faint at the sight of you—"

"Shut up already, I'm going to transform now," Sirius announced. Where he stood a while ago was the hulking mass of a bear-sized black dog.

"Why should we call you Padfoot? Grim would be better," James insisted.

"Moony, Wormtail, Grim and Prongs?" Remus said quizzically, taking out the Marauder's Map that they had made last year. 

"Hey, how come _we're _not included in the title?" Lily demanded, snatching the parchment from Remus. "We contributed a lot there, you know."

"But you're not Animagi," Sirius pointed out.

"I am," Chase said.

"Oh yeah." Sirius said sheepishly.

"You're still an Animagus illegally, Chase," Celeste reminded.

"And so? Look at the three people in front of you! Besides, what am I going to tell them if I register? 'Hi, my name's Chase Tarlise, and I've been meaning to register since I was ten years old, but I didn't because I wanted to visit my sister at her house without my dad knowing. Yeah, and he's also the Head of the Department of Mysteries, and he'd kill me if he knew that his own daughter didn't abide in the law for almost five years.'" Chase scoffed.

"What about Jamie, Pete and Siri? 'We'd like to register. Why? Well, we decided to become Animagi because one of our friends is a werewolf and we'd like to keep him company whenever there's a full moon and he might be lonely,'" Lily jumped in and rolled her eyes. "Seriously, Celes, you just can't explain some things to authority figures. There are just some things that are better kept to yourself."

"Fine, fine, I'm always the wrong one, aren't I? Since when did pointing out the right thing to do become a crime?" Celeste grumbled. 

Sirius gave her a smug grin. "Since you joined our gang. If you oppose, then maybe it would be better if you revoke your membership," he said mock-seriously.

Celeste slumped against her chair. "I'm not leaving," Celeste mumbled.

"It was just a joke, Celes," Sirius told her. 

The train started to move. 

"Finally," Lily said with a sigh of relief.

"I'm hungry!" Sirius announced.

"You're always hungry, you bottomless pit," Remus chuckled. 

"Can I go to the front to the lady with the food cart even if it isn't lunch yet?"

"Nah, she wouldn't. She knows very well that all her wares could be gone in a blimp if _you're_ the customer. Haven't you noticed that for the past three years, she's been going to our compartment last when she's selling candy? In our first year, you almost cleaned her out." James opened the curtains that had been neglected for the past thirty minutes.

The trip back to school wasn't as typical as usual, for one, Snape and his gang didn't infiltrate their compartment once (perhaps they had had enough of being mutilated every new start of the school year), and it was uneventfully quiet before lunch. When the witch with the tea cart arrived, Sirius jumped up eagerly and bought two of everything. As he opened a bag of Every Flavor Beans, the others were sorely reminded of the "game" they had played last year, where the one who ate the most decent-flavored beans would win. Peter still got urges to vomit everytime he saw a jellybean. (he was the one who suggested the game and got the least number of good beans: 2)

"Are you alright, Pete?" Remus asked concernedly, watching his suddenly pale-faced friend.

Peter gulped before turning away from a gray jellybean that Sirius popped into his mouth. "No, I'm OK," he gasped.

"If you say so," Remus said with a shrug. "Hey, Sirius, give me one of those." He reached into the bag of beans in Sirius' outstretched hand and picked a blue one. The blue ones were the only safe beans since they almost always turned out to be blueberry. On the occasion that this wasn't so, however, the manufacturers must have just colored other flavors artificially blue as a little trick to innocent consumers. 

"Me too," Chase said, extracting a handful of beans from the pack. She had won the bean game last year, with 24 good beans out of thirty. As Lily said at some point of their four-year friendship, she was "always the lucky one." Lily's prediction was right.

"I can't see how you guys can still eat that after the game we played last year," Lily said queasily. The memory of the taste of the "cockroach guts" bean (as she commonly referred to it) still stayed vividly on her tongue. 

"You're just saying that because you're the third loser to the game," Sirius told her.

"Yeah, but I don't understand why you, the second loser next to Pete, are still eating those things," responded Lily.

"At least I've got the courage to eat it again instead of moping around saying 'Woe is me, I have forbidden myself from eating Every Flavor Beans because I fear that I might come across a shit-flavored one—'" 

"Here Sirius," Chase said, handing him a golden-brown bean.

"Thanks," Sirius said, popping it into his mouth and almost simultaneously spitting it out. "Shit! What flavor is this?!"

"Exactly," Chase responded, smirking.

Sirius blushed slightly, noting the effect she still had on him even after months of separation. "What do you mean?"

"It's shit flavor, dummy," Lily said, rolling her eyes. "And they call you smart."

"Tut, tut, Lil, envy is a deadly sin," Sirius preached.

Lily's eyes widened. "Omigod Sirius, I didn't know you're Catholic."

"I am _not _Catholic, you take that back Lily Evans—"

"Then how come you know the seven deadly sins?" 

"What the hell are you blubbering about, I don't know what that is, but if there is one thing I understand, you're the one who's Catholic."

"No, I'm not! Witches aren't Catholic, Sirius!"

"Then so are wizards, you dolt! Honestly, Lily, I think you're just jealous of people who have more intellectual capacity than yourself, say, moi—"

"Ha, you, intelligent? Compared to who? Avery?" Lily sneered.

Sirius threw his wand at her and it hit her on her forehead. Lily retaliated by throwing it back, but it made for Chase in a rain of sparks, who dodged it instantly. 

"Obviously you lack proper Quidditch skills as well," Sirius snickered.

"And how is that?" Lily asked, crossing her arms defiantly.

"Well, for one, you couldn't dodge a wand when you know it's coming at you, let alone a Bludger, and two, you don't know how to aim, and if you were a Chaser then you'd be a sorry addition to the team," Sirius honestly replied.

Lily sighed. "How girls still cling to you after knowing that you're such a jerk is beyond me," she mumbled.

"Will you guys just quit it? You two sound like an old married couple," Chase groaned.

Both Sirius and Lily turned their heads at her, Lily with a glare, Sirius with a funny expression that none of them could decipher. "_What did you say?!!!_" Lily said in a steely voice. 

"I was only joking, Lil. Do you have PMS right now, by any chance?" 

Chase had to transform into a phoenix and fly away from her seat to dodge the hex that Lily hurled at her. The place she previously occupied now grew scales and a long, fork-shaped tongue.

The phoenix turned back into a girl in the middle of the compartment. Chase adopted a fake disappointed expression. "Aw, Lil, you shouldn't have. Believe me, Celeste would be the one who'd look much better as a boa constrictor. See, she always was addicted to snakeskin shoes and bags—" Celeste gave her twin a look that would probably have melted iron.

Lily laughed and put her wand back into her robes. Soon, the sky became darker and the train slowed down, stopping at Hogsmeade station. The students poured out of the train and fought over horseless carriages, since usually the last few ran out and they were forced to walk to Hogwarts a long way. As usual, the first years were led by the gamekeeper to the lake (Ogg was replaced by Hagrid, who had been his assistant ever since Hagrid was expelled in his third year). The seven of them couldn't fit in just one carriage, so amid the confusion and chatter of impatient others behind them, Lily, Remus, Celeste and Peter were pushed into one carriage while Sirius, James and Chase were left with the next.

Sirius and James laughed and joked as they waited for the carriages to take them to the castle. Chase, on the other hand, was reading a newspaper clipping that was in her pocket.

James was slapping Sirius on the back when he noticed Chase skimming through the article. "Hey, what's that you have there, Chase?" 

Sirius focused his attention on the clipping too. "That's the one about the descendant of Grindelwald, the Dark wizard that Dumbledore defeated a long time ago. I think his name started with a D or something that sounded like it…"

"Demertyon," Chase supplied. "He blew up a lesser wizarding school just a few weeks ago. It says here that the students are supposed to transfer to Hogwarts while theirs is being rebuilt."

"Did they catch him yet?" James asked, a worried expression on his face.

Chase shrugged. "Dunno. Dad says the Ministry's going haywire though, because of covering up all the deaths he caused. He's not something we could worry about much, though, none of the Dark wizards ever dare to come near Hogwarts. I think it's because Dumbledore's there, and since he was the one who defeated Grindelwald…"

"Demertyon wouldn't want to attack the school in a hurry," James finished. "That's probably it."

The carriage came to a stop and they jumped outside on the damp grass. Hundreds of black-clad people were swarming the entrance doors already, waiting for it to open.

The group of seven hurriedly slipped into the Great Hall to keep from being squashed to a pulp by the other students. All the professors were already there, as well as a few more unfamiliar ones—probably teachers from the other school.

As all the students (except the first years) were assembled into the Hall, Dumbledore stood up and cleared his throat; a mere gesture that made all of them fall silent in an instant.

"Welcome to another year at Hogwarts," Dumbledore started, his eyes twinkling behind his glasses. "Another year to complicate your minds with endless spells, magical history and other facts of the wizarding world that you surely wouldn't want after the long summer holidays you spent leaking them out of your heads—" The whole Hall echoed with the sound of moans and groans— "But still, we should be grateful, very grateful, that we are still here today. We are extremely lucky that Hogwarts isn't the next target of any Dark wizards or groups, or so I hope…" A few students started to look nervous at his pronouncement. 

"On a less depressing note, we have here today our guests for the whole school year. I do hope that you will make them feel welcome to Hogwarts, as much as they would have done for us too had we been the ones in trouble. Everyone, I would like you all to meet—"

There was a sudden shuffling at the entrance to the Hall, and about two hundred witches and wizards, all donned in bright blue robes and hats, appeared. Some Hogwarts students stood up to look at them. The students outside the Hall were looking apprehensive.

And Dumbledore continued, "—the students of the Zynergrand Academy."

*****

**AN – **I know, the first chap doesn't seem like much but I promise it will get better…besides, this is just the introduction, what'd u expect… Review pleeeeaaaaase, so that I would be happy and be inspired to write more and put up the next chapter. If u don't, then…


	2. You're in!

Complications 

**By Dimantrien**

**Chapter 2: You're In!**

The Sorting ceremony for the first years was finished rather quickly because the whole of the Zynergrand Academy's student body still needed to be sorted. By the time it was finished, Sirius complained that he was suffering from stomach pains and the Slytherins (now added with more mean-looking recruits) were banging their forks and spoons on the table loudly. 

All the Zynergrand-turned-Gryffindor students were introducing themselves and striking up friendly conversation with the original Hogwarts students all around them as they ate. One such student was a pale-blonde-haired, bright blue-eyed girl sitting across from Celeste.

"Hi!" the girl said cheerfully. She was about their age. "My name's Rhiannon Gilchrist."

"Celeste Schoharie," Celeste said, shaking Rhiannon's outstretched hand. "This is my sister Chase," she added, gesturing at Chase.

"And this is our best friend Lily," Chase continued, slapping a hand onto Lily's shoulder.

"This is Remus Lupin," Lily supplied before Remus could speak. 

Remus looked at James and pointed a hitch-hiker thumb at him. "James Potter, the Transfiguration genius of the fifth year and the second-highest detention record-holder of all-time Hogwarts history," he deadpanned.

James grinned at Rhiannon. "And here's the filler of the number one spot with 1, 759 detentions to date, currently the most popular boy in Hogwarts…"

"Drum roll please," Sirius requested. James snatched Remus' wand and got out his own, improvising a drum roll with them and a clean plate.

"Sirius Black," James finished. Rhiannon, like all girls did, had an expression on her face that clearly said that she fancied Sirius a lot. 

"Thank you, James," Sirius said in a mock-superior tone. "And this is…Peter Pettigrew, resident scaredy-cat of Gryffindor." 

James kicked him.

"OW! I mean, one of the most—er—_honored _and _noble _people I have ever known," Sirius lied quickly. As they resumed their meal, Sirius fake-coughed loudly before picking up his fork and spoon.

"That was one of the biggest lies I have ever said to anybody," he said fervently, earning a glare from James. 

Rhiannon laughed. "Nice to meet all of you. This is Damaris Callypso," she said, pointing to the green-eyed brunette next to her. 

Everybody chorused their "Hi's."

"So, how was Zynergrand before it got smashed?" Sirius asked offhandedly. James, Remus, Celeste and Lily glared at him. Chase smirked; Peter merely gulped and looked fearfully from Sirius to the two new girls as if one of them would explode any second. 

"It was nice," Damaris said in a soft voice, her deep green eyes showing a hint of sadness. "Though Hogwarts is much bigger, of course," she added in a forced-cheerful tone.

Lily gave Sirius a look that clearly said, "You shouldn't have said that you idiot." 

There was a moment of awkward silence. Sirius, aware that he had caused it, said, "So…anything new, you guys?"

Lily smacked the back of her hand on her forehead. "I can't believe I didn't tell you guys yet! It totally slipped from my mind…"

"What is it?" Celeste asked, leaning forward. Lily paused.

"Well? I'm dying of suspense," Chase said sardonically.

"I'm a prefect!" Lily said happily.

Another silence. Then, "WHAT?!!!!!" Sirius yelled. Half the Hall turned around in their seats and stared at him. All their other friends didn't look too happy either. Everyone's faces, including Chase's, was filled with shock and disbelief.

Lily reached into her robes and pulled out a shiny silver badge with "Prefect" engraved in it in bold letters. "See?"

"But-but you can't be a prefect," Sirius sputtered. "You broke almost all the school rules ever listed in the official Hogwarts Student Handbook for the past four years! They can't make you a prefect after that!"

All their other friends were nodding in agreement, still momentarily speechless. Finally, Celeste found her voice.

"You're joking, right? I hear that all the professors of the fourth year had to have a deliberation to consider the candidates, and if they did, then McGonagall and Ridgewood would be the first to oppose your appointment! How can you still be appointed a prefect if your behavioral assessment is below F?"

Lily scowled at her. "You didn't have to make me sound that bad," she accused.

"She's just jealous 'cause after slaving away for four years as a devotee to discipline and rules, she wasn't made a prefect—" Chase started to say with a smirk but halted after receiving another of Celeste's glares. 

"But you wouldn't be able to do any pranks," Peter protested. 

"So? James, Sirius and Remus are the ones always doing them anyway, I'll just help with the planning and researching."

"But what about the charms—"

"We can't apply most of the pranks without your help—"

 "Chill out! There's nothing you should all be so dismayed about, this way we can take loads of points off things that the Slytherins do that escape the teachers' attention," Lily pointed out.

"Fine," Sirius said sulkily. "What now, we've lost one of our best charm-casters…"

Lily rolled her eyes. "You're making too big a deal out of this, Sirius…"

None of them discussed the matter further after that. 

After a while, they were served the desserts, then finally permitted to go up to their respective dormitories. As soon as they got there, the boys ran to the direction of their staircase and out of sight. 

"Why'd they leave so soon?" Damaris asked, staring after them.

"Off to plan a fresh prank on the newly-sorted Slytherins, I expect," Lily replied. "C'mon, let's go up to the dormitory…"

When they got there, it was magically expanded and five new beds were added. Celeste looked at something at the side of the room and said, "YES!"

"Say what?" Chase asked, looking at her as if she were weird.

Celeste pointed. "The showers! They added nine more!"

Lily whooped. "All right! No more waiting till the crack of dawn for Celeste to finish taking a bath so that we can have a turn!" she exclaimed, slapping high-fives with Chase.

"Yep, no more need to conjure a thousand cockroaches to make her come out," Chase added with a laugh, glancing at Celeste out of the corner of her eye and smirking as Celeste scowled. Celeste hated cockroaches, and Chase had increased her fear in them because of a spell she did last year.

"Whatever Chase. At least now I don't need to take a bath with the fear that you're going to overrun me with those hideous things again."

"Or aren't I?" Chase answered amusedly. "You know, I can still set them on you even if our bathroom has improved—"

Celeste quickly darted into the bathroom, locking the door behind her. 

"I think she's improving," Chase remarked as she pulled on her nightgown. "She doesn't scream anymore when I mention roaches."

*****  

The next day was as rainy as ever. However, it was a Sunday, so they had no schoolwork to worry about yet. The marauders set off the first full day in the school at breakfast by using Hidden Hair Switch spells on the Slytherins, where the boys exchanged hair with a Slytherin girl as soon as they sat down at the table. Snape looked very hilarious indeed with Bernadette Zabini's blonde hair on his scalp. He looked even more ludicrous because he still kept his shaggy black eyebrows, making for a very queer combination. Bernadette was revolted that she had gotten Snape's greasy hair, of all people's. 

No amount of magic could undo the spells, except for the one the countercurse that only the marauders knew. This infuriated the Slytherins a bit too much, since they couldn't reverse the trick for nearly half an hour. The three remaining houses were still laughing themselves sick when the professors arrived, switching back the Slytherins' hair and telling off the marauders loudly. Professor McGonagall gave them a detention.

His stomach aching with laughter, Sirius stopped sniggering and looked up at the High Table. "Somebody's missing," he said, staring at the full table. "There're all the Zynergrand teachers, but—"

"Ridgewood's not there!" James said suddenly, and they exchanged sly grins. 

"Alright!!! I knew it, I knew he was going to be sacked…" Sirius proclaimed.

"I really hope they give us a decent Potions teacher this time," Remus said. Ridgewood was last year's Slytherin Head of House and one of the most rotten former-Slytherin teachers they had, save maybe for their third-year Astronomy teacher who already resigned, Professor Witzgromeneirre. 

"Yeah. All the Potions teachers we've ever had, even the substitutes, were _always_ Slytherins. That's why I've always hated Potions…" Sirius said disgustedly.

"What are you talking about? You're the top Potions student! Or, at least you would have been, if Ridgewood hadn't favored Snape so much," James trailed off. Snape had gotten top marks in their fourth year exams.

"What's our first subject tomorrow?" Rhiannon asked.

Celeste read her schedule. "Care of Magical Creatures with the Hufflepuffs, then Herbology with the Ravenclaws…"

"Good, I couldn't stand a double Potions with the Slytherins just yet," Chase said with a sigh of relief. 

"After lunch is Transfiguration," Celeste finished. "Chase, you _did _do your over-the-summer Transfiguration homework, didn't you?" she asked sternly. 

"Yes I did, sergeant," Chase responded, raising her hand to her forehead in mock salute.. "Ten inches of parchment more than McGonagall asked for, even."

"Good," Celeste said, her face relaxing.

"And Celeste?"

"Yes?"

"Will you stop acting like you're mum's substitute whenever she's not around?"

Celeste threw a handful of bacon bits at her.

"C'mon you guys, we need to look up spells," James told them.

"And a lot of it," Sirius added. "The Slytherins are in for the scare of their lives…"

Peter groaned. "And I thought that we wouldn't jump into school books until _tomorrow._"

"It's all for a good cause, you know," Remus laughed. It was quite ironic, though, because the teachers certainly didn't think so. 

"Are you sure that it's OK to keep playing tricks on the Slytherins?" Damaris asked, her forehead creasing with worry.

"'Course it is. Once you meet them personally you'll see what we're talking about," James explained. 

*****  

The next day, Care of Magical Creatures commenced just as Celeste said. Professor Kettleburn brought several cages of live gargoyles that looked at them through the metal bars in a vindictive way, flexing their bony fingers and showing two-inch, knife-sharp claws. None of the Hufflepuffs seemed to want to go near them, and some Gryffindors looked a bit skeptical when Kettleburn told them that the gargoyles were "perfectly safe." This didn't turn out to be so because once Kettleburn released one of the monsters, it swooped around them and made a horrible shrieking sort of noise.

A huddle of Hufflepuff girls squealed and hid behind a garden shed. The remaining students tried valiantly to look as if they weren't scared one jolt without much success. Only Sirius, who thrived on chaos almost as much as Peeves did, looked satisfied with the whole incident.

"Yeah! Come here! Are you blind or stupid? I'm over here!" he yelled, jumping up and down like a maniac, waving his arms at the gliding monster. 

But the gargoyle must have sensed his boldness, and ignored him. Kettleburn told them before he had opened a cage that gargoyles liked to frighten people who were already scared of them.

Celeste screamed as the gargoyle playfully swooped inches from her head. Chase rolled her eyes. 

"It's just a gargoyle, there's nothing to be afraid of," Chase called as Celeste joined the Hufflepuff girls. 

Professor Kettleburn was trying to restore the peace. "Students! There is nothing to be frightened of! As long as you remain calm, the gargoyles will not hurt you! Here! Don't run away, I say! The only reason that they're scaring you is because you are afraid!" 

But anything he said was futile; the class was in utter chaos and several of them had already run up to the school to get away from the dreaded gargoyle. And, of course, the gargoyle followed.

"STOP!!!" Kettleburn yelled at the top of his lungs. He turned around and saw that the only students who remained were the marauders, Lily, Chase, Damaris, Rhiannon, and a few Hufflepuff boys whose legs knocked together because of shaking too much. Obviously they had stuck to Kettleburn's advice, even though they looked that they would pee into their pants any second.

_"Stupefy!" _Kettleburn yelled, and the gargoyle doubled over in the air before crashing to the ground. 

Kettleburn sighed. "Well, I guess it's no use teaching half a class, and this was supposed to be a double period… Class dismissed."

Sirius whooped. Chaos was definitely better than cancelled classes, but it was a better option than sitting on the grass and listening to Kettleburn drone on and on about the evolution of gargoyles (probably a cross between a bat and a monkey, he thought) and how the Ministry managed to keep them from the Muggle world. He and his friends strolled back to Gryffindor Tower and enjoyed the remaining one and a half hour that Kettleburn had cancelled. After that, Herbology.

Professor Sprout did roll call since there were added students and introduced them to their newest lesson: handling Venemous Tentacula. Even though the sharp-toothed plants were ever-present in the greenhouses they worked in, they had never had a formal lesson on them before. By the end of the class one fourth of the total students were sent to the hospital wing while the remaining ones nearly set fire to greenhouse three by burning the Tentaculas. 

Professor Sprout was enraged at them for destroying her precious plants and took 10 points each from every student that joined in the fire-conjuring (20 from Sirius because he was the one who started it), and gave them such a load of homework that not even the cunning marauders could finish in a jiffy. 

"Thirty species of Sauctheis with full information on each one! Including footnotes! What the hell is she playing at?!" Sirius ranted furiously as they trudged back to the castle for lunch.

"Well, you _did _start it Sirius," James reminded him. "Don't forget, if you hadn't thought of fire as the first thing to ward off the Tentaculas then the others wouldn't have panicked enough to do the same—"

"And it's due on Wednesday! _Wednesday! _That's like the next session of Herbology!" Sirius continued, ignoring James.

"She would've just given us twenty, before_ you _argued with her and made her even madder," Lily said crossly. 

"I thought that things were finally looking up when Kettleburn cancelled our double period but this is worse that karma…" Sirius complained.

"Sirius, quit whining and shut up!" Lily practically screamed in his ear. They entered the Great Hall, which was already packed with students. 

Lunch slightly lifted Sirius' spirits. They had hidden Aging Enchantments in the Slytherin Table that were triggered as soon as they lifted their spoons. Every Slytherin felt feeble and old as they suddenly sprouted long beards, silver and whitish hair, age spots and wrinkled features. Professor McGonagall once again yelled herself hoarse at the marauders, knowing it was all in vain, since they would just do another prank the next day even though they would face detention. She couldn't expel them either. Being the smartest students in the school definitely had its merits.

This was why McGonagall was in such a foul mood during Transfiguration. 

"And I don't want any of those vases with beaks on them at the end of the period!" McGonagall said strictly in a peeved tone. They were given duck-billed platypuses to turn into vases for a practical quiz. The Gryffindors were a bit hesitant in touching the ugliest mammals in the world to date, and only Chase dared to lift one from the enormous cage. A moment later, the platypus swiped at her arm hard with one sharp, poisonous claw and she dropped it abruptly.

"This," she said through gritted teeth and slightly watery eyes, holding out her bloody arm while some girls in the class screeched and looked away, "is what makes Transfiguration such an idiotic, pointless subject—"

"Shhhh!" Celeste shushed her, keeping an eye out for McGonagall. The wound was pretty deep at such short range and she was sent to the hospital wing with Damaris, trailing blood after her. 

"I hope she's alright," Lily said worriedly as she watched Chase and Damaris leave.

"Chase wouldn't cry even if her whole arm was on fire, don't worry about it Lil," Celeste assured offhandedly.

"She _never_ cries?" Rhiannon asked in amazement. "Not even once?" 

Celeste shifted uncomfortably, glancing at the guys, who were listening in. "Well, there was one incident last year when she—"

Lily gave her a "Shut-up-this-is-not-the-time-to-gossip" expression and she instantly closed her mouth.

"Er, it's not something worth telling, really," she said instead. "Anyway, let's get started on these platypuses…"

By the end of the period, only James, Lily, Sirius and Celeste had successfully turned their platypuses into vases, but McGonagall had taken twenty points from Gryffindor since Sirius had tried to stun his to keep it from attacking him ("Well, how else would I still keep my arm flawless until the end of the period?" he had shouted at McGonagall.). Overall, McGonagall's mood remained the same (if not grew worse) when the bell rang signaling the end of classes for that day. Everyone was in quite a hurry to leave the classroom.

McGonagall held James back and told him that he had to tutor Damaris in Transfiguration. 

"But she nearly got the spell right during the period," he said, confused. "Why does she still need tutoring?"

"It was standard in Zynergrand," Professor McGonagall said firmly. "Her parents have requested it since she started her first year. Apparently their family has been renowned for Transfiguration techniques and she was the only one who couldn't perfect it. She needs all the help she could get, Potter, and since you're the best student in Transfiguration, it would be easy to teach her."

"Fine," James said with a shrug. "When do we start?"

"Saturday at a quarter past one in the Charms classroom," Professor McGonagall answered. "Be prompt, Potter. And show them what a Gryffindor is made of," she said, giving him a slight smile. No doubt she was still annoyed at his prank instincts, but she couldn't go not giving her best student credit for his work.

*****    

After dinner in the Gryffindor common room, Chase still hadn't shown up. James and Sirius were sitting by the fireplace in their usual chairs, doing their homework.

"Think you can still get her back, Sirius?" James asked him casually as he stared at the flames.

Sirius sighed. His and Chase's breakup wasn't either of their fault, but by a Ravenclaw who had made Sirius drink a Love Potion to fall in love with her. Sirius wasn't over Chase yet and there was no reason to be, since, in his opinion, it wasn't fair that they should have broken up. "I don't know."

A grin spread on James' face. "I bet you don't," he said suddenly.

Sirius looked at him. "And why is that?" he challenged.

"Because," James said with a smirk, "You've never been one to hold a relationship long. Besides, you have to face facts, friend. How many times have you dated somebody and broke up with them, and went with another girl three days later without a second thought?"

"You sure have ways to bring your friends down, don't you?" Sirius said sarcastically. Of course he knew that he had a fixed reputation on him. But that didn't mean that he couldn't change. That was what he liked about Chase. She was totally unpredictable, and didn't act the way all the other girls he had dated. She was different.

James' eyes sparkled. Sirius suspected that his thoughts were probably written all over his face. "I bet that in less than a week, you'll get over her and go out with another girl," he announced.

"What?!" was Sirius' immediate reaction. "Wait a minute," he said, his eyes narrowing. "You're just tricking me. How would you be so sure, anyway? If it took me more than three months and I still haven't gotten over her, why are you so confident that I'll go back to the way I was in days?"

"It's instinct," James answered honestly. "And I have something that'll support my guess too. With the whole of the Zynergrand student body adding to Hogwarts' populace, you'll have plenty of new people to date." 

"Whatever James. I'm telling you, you're going to lose that bet."

"Fine with me. If I win, you'll have to do my bidding for the same number of days that takes you to date somebody else. And I decide what days those will be, and they can be on separate months, no matter how long the gap."

"And if you lose, you'll have to be my servant for six whole days with the same conditions as what you just said, since you bet less than a week," Sirius said smugly. "Deal?"

James took Sirius' outstretched hand and shook it. "Deal."

*****

The week flew past and it was Saturday. Sirius found that Rhiannon was as much of a food fan as he was, and every lunch they held eating contests in the Great Hall. He was so happy with the competition that he "officially" confirmed them part of their gang and labels of the title "marauders." 

"C'mon," he said, dragging her out of the Hall after lunch. "You gotta know where the kitchen is. There are tons more food in there than here."

"Okay," Rhiannon agreed. "But won't anybody see us? We might get in trouble—"

"Don't worry about that. Let's go!" They disappeared in the crowd going out of the Hall. 

James looked at his watch. "We have to go too," he said, addressing Damaris. "McGonagall's a pincher for punctuality. I can't afford another detention next week, since Sirius and I are going to execute a prank in the Slytherin common room and only Wednesday is free…"

"Have fun," Chase called as they left. "Although I wouldn't count on it, as it's Transfiguration we're talking about…"

Damaris laughed and waved goodbye.

"What are we going to do now?" Lily asked the remaining marauders. 

"Do another prank?" Remus suggested.

"I can't, I'm a prefect," Lily reminded.

"Oh yeah," Remus said. "Then what?"

"Want to visit Hagrid?" Celeste suggested.

The five stood up and headed for Hagrid's hut.

*****   

"You're getting it…just make the 'r' sound longer…" James said.

_"Atverte!" _Damaris cried, pointing at the silver spoon in front of her. It turned into a snail.

James clapped. "Good job! Since you've already got the hang of it, we'd better blow this joint…" He started packing up his books and all the materials that they had used for the tutorial. 

Damaris watched him turn the snail back into a spoon without an effort. "You make it look so easy."

James shrugged. "It's nothing, really. Anybody can do it as long as they concentrate." He went back to the process of putting all his Transfiguration books into his bag.

The chestnut-haired girl just waited silently for him to finish. She couldn't help but notice how handsome James was, after all, he _was _one of the most good-looking and popular boys in the school. Damaris wondered if he had a girlfriend. She never saw him with one; there were Celeste, Chase and Lily but they never seemed to show a particular display of intimacy for him. 

"Hey James?" she asked, almost starting to regret that she did.

"Yep?"

"Er…um…do you…"

James looked up from his bag. "Sorry, what did you say?" he asked apologetically.

Damaris felt herself turning red. "Never mind," she mumbled. "Nothing important."

"OK, if you're sure," James said. "You can tell me if something's bothering you though," he added, his voice filled with concern.

Damaris' heart skipped. He was really different from other boys. Back at Zynergrand they only used to care about taking advantage of her. 

"I mean, we're friends, right?" said James, shouldering his backpack. 

Friends. Damaris never had a friend that was a boy before. Rhiannon had been her only real friend, but it was much easier because she was a girl too. 

"All done!" James announced. "We can go now…wait, I forgot to turn out the lights…" With a wave of his hand, all the lamps in the room were extinguished, making it reasonably dark. 

Damaris stood beside him in the gloom. If he really didn't have a girlfriend…there was only one way to find out…

"Are you OK? You look kinda pale all of a sudden," James said. He moved closer to her, his face filled with worry. 

Before she could change her mind, Damaris grabbed him by his shoulders and kissed him. James was surprised at first, but she kissed him slowly and softly, waiting for him to respond. Somewhere in her hazed mind, she vaguely noticed the room flooding with light as the door opened, but she couldn't care less…

Until she heard the sound of several books crashing to the floor, causing James to break away from her as fast as she had grabbed him. His face paled.

*****   

James was shocked. Damaris had just kissed him, which he never thought she was going to do. He usually knew when girls liked him or not, but Damaris was so impassive that he found it hard to read her expressions. Didn't she know that he already had a girlfriend?

But suddenly the door opened and James pulled away from her. _Please don't let it be Lily, please don't let it be Lily…_

He looked at the door, but the one who opened it wasn't Lily. His face paled nonetheless.

It was Chase. And the look on her face said it all. It was a look of complete and utter shock; her already large blue eyes looked even bigger, round with disbelief. 

As abruptly as she had entered, Chase's face changed again to its normal indifferent expression, and she muttered a spell that sent all her books flying back into her arms. Without saying a single word, she stepped out of the doorway and walked out.

"I'm—I'm so sorry James, I didn't know… I didn't know that she was your-your—" Damaris started to stammer, but James shook his head.

"She's not my girlfriend, Damaris…but I really have to go…" He stepped three paces away.

"But-but why did she look so shocked?" Damaris asked timidly. James almost felt like comforting her. She looked like she might crumble any second if he said the wrong words.

But the damage that she had caused was too great; he couldn't do anything about it. Still, he never was one to put a girl down when she was upset.

"She was just surprised, you know… Chase isn't used to walking into people kissing, maybe that was why…" _What the hell am I doing? _He wondered. He had to tell the truth; he couldn't afford to lie.

Damaris visibly relaxed. "So, it was okay?" she asked him.

_NO! _his inner voice screamed. It was _not _okay. Not if Chase told Lily, not if he would stop acting stupid and just tell her the damned truth…

"James, do you have a girlfriend?" Damaris asked, her look almost hopeful. 

"I gotta go," he said suddenly, bolting out the door before he had time to answer. He had to catch up with Chase. He reached the nearest intersection of halls, but Chase was nowhere in sight.

Where had she run off to?

*****  

Sirius reached the portrait of the bowl of fruit and tickled the pear. As soon as the passage into the kitchen opened, he said in a mock-gentleman voice, "After you, m'lady."

Rhiannon rolled her eyes but laughed nonetheless. She stepped into the enormous kitchen, her mouth wide open in awe. 

"Nice, isn't it?" Sirius said amusedly, taking in her amazed expression. Hundreds of house elves, four long tables that looked suspiciously familiar, and uncountable piles of all foods imaginable. 

"Sirius Black! So nice to see yous, sir, so nice indeed! It has been exactly five days since the start of the school year, sir, and still yous haven't visited! Dipelfis was getting worried about yous!" a high-pitched voice said.

Sirius and Rhiannon looked down and saw a male house elf which Sirius had nicknamed "Door-elf Dipelfis." He was the house elf who usually stood by the entrance to the kitchens and greeted the visitor extremely eagerly and asked for anything they wanted in particular. 

"Nice to see you again," Sirius said with a grin. "Now, me and my friend are really hungry, so we want a bit of that, and that, and a little bit of this too…" Sirius started walking around the kitchens, pointing at the different foods that the house elves had used their magic on to preserve their heat (they were already made into dishes) and made them taste like newly-cooked food again. Three house elves immediately trailed after Sirius, carrying dishes of the things he wanted. Three more set one of the tables up. 

"Perfect!" Sirius said with a clap of his hands as soon as everything was ready. 

"This is officially the 14th eating contest we have to date, occurring at the Hogwarts kitchen, on the day of September the seventh, at exactly 1:43 pm. Whoever loses this battle will have to act like a duck in the Gryffindor common room for three hours straight," he announced solemnly. Rhiannon couldn't help it and burst out laughing. 

"You're on," Rhiannon said confidently. "Get ready to practice your duck quack, Black, 'cause you are going down."

"Ah, arrogance. Just what I like in a girl," Sirius deadpanned. He smirked as Rhiannon blushed slightly. "On your marks...get set…go!!!"

The "battle" was over in six minutes, fifteen seconds and twenty-one milliseconds, as a very precise house-elf named Accura kindly yelled out when they finished. It took the two fifth years six minutes, fifteen seconds and twenty-one milliseconds to finish ten different dishes in dinner-sized plates, two plates of rice, and fourteen side dishes. 

"I beat you!" Sirius said triumphantly.

"No you didn't!" Rhiannon protested. "We tied. I ate that last corn kernel just as you shoved a spoonful of steak in your mouth."

Sirius raised an eyebrow at Accura, who nodded vigorously. He sighed. "You can't argue with an accurate house elf," he said in defeat. "This battle is a draw."

Rhiannon whooped. Sirius looked at her. How could she manage to eat that much food and still keep her table etiquette??? There wasn't a single grain of rice on her robes and her lips were perfectly devoid of any trace of sauce or whipped cream, whereas Sirius looked like a pig. Rhiannon voiced that thought immediately.

"Sirius, you look like a total pig," she giggled.

"But a cute pig," he replied slyly. 

"Fine, I'll give you cute," she said. "What time is it? I still have to meet up with Damaris, she promised to help me with History of Magic."

"It's 1:52," Sirius informed, glancing at his watch. 

"OK, then let's go." Both of them waited for a minute, but they didn't move. 

"Why aren't you standing up?" Rhiannon asked.

"Why aren't _you _standing up?" Sirius countered. Then they both laughed.

Sirius suddenly stopped laughing and looked straight at Rhiannon's blue eyes. They were almost the same blue as Chase's, only a tad darker. He missed Chase, he really did, and he swore that he would get her back. But how?

He moved closer to Rhiannon without realizing it, until their faces were only an inch apart. Rhiannon's face flushed and she shifted in her seat. 

"Is it just me, or are you moving uncomfortably close and staring at me?" Rhiannon said uneasily.

Sirius smirked. "It's just you."

*****   

Her footsteps echoed through the empty corridors, but Chase didn't care. After that little run-in with James and Damaris, she went to the library, only to find Remus and Celeste making out at the Restricted Section. What next? Was she going to see Peter mauling some Hufflepuff girl in a broom closet? God! Was it just her, or had everybody gone mad and started a Smooch-Your-Friend campaign? Where was everybody, anyway? 

She still couldn't imagine the first thing she had seen though. James and Damaris…Chase was fairly certain that James and Lily weren't mad at each other for some reason, and they didn't even break up yet. She had vowed, ever since the Sirius-and-Maxine Eamon incident that had broken them apart, that she would never do anything to interfere with anybody's love life. But she couldn't just get that scene out of her head. It had been she, after all, who had brought James and Lily together in the first place. 

She headed for the kitchens, thinking vaguely that there was a chance that Lily also noticed that nobody was around and had tagged after Sirius and Rhiannon. She tickled the pear and went in, and as soon as she did, another scene met her eyes, and her heart stopped.

Sirius and Rhiannon were snogging each other, right in the middle of the kitchens. Her heartbeat rate suddenly grew faster.

"Miss Chase! Is there anything I can do for yous today?" Dipelfis said brightly. Chase jumped back, surprised. 

"Not today, Dipelfis," she murmured, and practically fell out the entrance. She had to get out of there, before Dipelfis' loud voice could break Sirius and Rhiannon apart, before they could notice her and throw her pitying looks…

She hated pity. Moreover, she hated drama and she hated tears. But as she ran as fast as she could through the halls, trying to get as much space between her and the happy couple in the kitchen, she came to one ironic conclusion. 

Even cynics cried sometimes.

*****  

Lily was reading a thick hardbound book on her bed when Chase suddenly burst in. She headed straight for the shower, which was a very un-Chase-like thing to do. 

"Everything OK, Chase?" she called to be heard over the sound of water beating against tile.

"Right. I actually got the urge to take a shower when I'm perfectly clean. That's _so_ warped," Chase retorted sarcastically. Lily chuckled. Yep, everything was under control over there. 

"Where are the rest of the guys?" Lily asked her.

Chase didn't respond. Now, _that _was strange. Lily was pretty sure that Chase didn't answer any questions only when she was upset. Which was extremely rare. And if there was something bothering Chase, Lily had to find out, because few things could perturb the most indifferent cynic Hogwarts had ever known. 

Lily grinned. The only thing that she had ever known to bother Chase was the S-factor.

"Oh Cha-ase," she singsonged through the door.

"What?" Chase asked in an echo-like voice in the bathroom with a tone of suspicion.

"I know what made you upset."

"How would you know that I'm upset?" Chase challenged. She turned off the shower.

"It's about Sirius, isn't it?" Lily said with a smirk. 

Chase opened the door, clad in a towel and another one wrapped around her hair. She rolled her eyes. "Interesting theory, my dear. But I'm so sorry to break it to you that I don't feel like wallowing in self-pity over something that happened ages ago." She went through her clothes and pulled on a blue t-shirt and white capri pants. 

Lily sighed. Why was Chase like this? She couldn't read her expression at all! After four years of friendship, Lily Evans still couldn't figure out if her friend was upset or just her plain old self. But Chase was like that. She was complicated.

"Are you absolutely sure that nothing's bothering you?" she asked again, just to be sure.

"Nope, there's nothing to worry about, Miss Thinks-She's-A-Shrink," Chase said with a smirk.

"OK." Lily flopped onto her bed on her stomach and went back to her book, looking a little disappointed.

"I'm going to take a nap," Chase told her.

Lily waved her hand. "I permit you. Go ahead," she teased.

Chase smirked and lay down on her bed. She turned to a position that faced away from Lily and the rest of the room and exhaled. She was, by far, the most persuasive person on the face of the planet. She actually felt bad for lying to Lily, but there was no other choice.

***** 

**AN – **Thanks to animegirl, Jumpers, Tins, and a person with an e-mail address of choochoochelly@yahoo.com (sorry, don't know the name) for reviewing! 


	3. The Truce

Complications 

**By Dimantrien**

**AN- **Thanx to NicolaPadfoot (I do agree, school must be the worst tragedy ever invented. And don't worry about Sirius and Chase, I'll work on it ^_^ Good luck with your homework! And come to think of it, I should be doing mine too right now…), LiTTle-TeaPoT (sorry if I didn't make their relationship evident, but I'll try to do better), animegirl (thanks for adding me to your fave authors list! I really appreciate it ^_^), squirt12c (thanks, but I don't know how I'm going to write the next chapter with all the holiday work my teachers piled on me…school really, really sucks…), and Christy (thanks for taking time to read my stories, I appreciate it a lot!) for reviewing. Luv you guys!

**Chapter 3: The Truce**

The bell rang signaling the end of Transfiguration—and Monday classes. Chase went out the door, thinking that she needed to get some serious work done about the hellish assignment that McGonagall had given (Name all the invented cross-species spells ever made, and give a short biography of each wizard who discovered it.). 

"Chase! Wait up!"

Chase stopped and whirled around to see James hurrying toward her. She sighed. "What do you want, Prongs?"

"Did you tell Lily?" he asked worriedly.

Chase rolled her eyes. "No I didn't, James…"

A look of relief spread on James' face.

"But only because I'm waiting for you to be the one to do so," she said in a neutral tone, starting to walk again. James trotted beside her, his face paling.

"B-but—Chase, I can't do that! It would destroy Lily! I don't want her to get hurt—"

"If you didn't want her to be hurt more than she already will when she finds out, then you would say it as soon as possible," was Chase's only reply.

"And what about Damaris? You know her, Chase…she's a nice girl, and she's really delicate…I don't know how to break it to her, she looks like she'll break into pieces if something upsets her."

"James, if you love Lily, then you would do what is best for both of you," Chase told him.

"And what is that?" James asked uncertainly.

"Tell her the truth."

"I can't do that!" he repeated.

Chase stopped walking again. "If you don't tell her in a week, I will."

James' face paled even more, if it was possible. "What? Please, Chase…no…"

"James, you know me. I hate interfering with anybody's relationship. But there are certain exceptions to that. Lily's my best friend, and you can't blame me for wanting to tell her things I know so that she won't get hurt. Did you even know what I did on Saturday? I lied to her, James, and I hate lying to her to keep something as serious as this from her…"

James sighed, looking dejected. 

"But before that, there's only one question. Which would you choose, Lily or Damaris?"

"I don't know…I love Lily, Chase…"

"Then you should tell Damaris that you're not interested in her."

"But I don't want Damaris to hate me either."

"James, you have to make sacrifices. Either you tell Damaris that she made a mistake, upset her and still be with Lily without any problems, or pick Damaris over Lily and let her get hurt…"

"I'll have to think about it. Will you at least not tell Lily until I make a decision?"

"Fine, James. But do it quick. You have only yourself to blame if this gets ugly." Chase opened the library door and disappeared inside. 

James stood in front of the closed library door, looking lost. What is it with Chase and the way her straight-to-the-point comments hit you hard?

*****  

The next day, they had their first Potions lesson. They didn't have Potions last week because the new teacher was "dealing with important matters about the reconstruction of Zynergrand." (Sirius had snorted at this announcement. "What help would a bunch of smelly liquid do in rebuilding a castle?") But everybody was glad of the two-hour complicated brew making that they were spared with, since nobody liked a class where the Slytherins were in with them. This time around, though, McGonagall had announced that their new teacher would be meeting them.

After five minutes of waiting, the new professor, clad in purple robes, swept into the dimly-lit dungeon. She looked like she was in her early thirties, and her blonde hair reached down to her waist. There were stares from male students all around, while some girls glanced at her warily.

"Good morning, class," the woman said briskly. "I am here as your new Potions teacher, since Professor Ridgewood has resigned to be of service to the Ministry of Magic."

"More like, 'was sacked because he couldn't add 2 to 8 when it came to Gryffindors' scores'" Sirius said under his breath.

"Before we move into the lesson proper, let me introduce myself. My name is—" She started writing on the board, making it hard for the marauders to read, and when she moved to the right, Sirius let out an audible gasp.

"Oh no…" he moaned. Written on the board in white script were the words "Professor Jayne Witzgromeneirre."

"W-witzgromeneirre?" James stuttered. "No way—is she the wife of that former-Slytherin scum teacher we had in third year?" 

"Must be. Witzgromeneirre isn't a very common name, you know…" Remus said grimly.

"Unbelievable. Who would actually agree to marry slime like that?" Lily breathed in amazement.

"It's obvious. People who are also slime themselves," Chase answered. "Which means that…"

"She's a _Slytherin,_" the others moaned.

Professor Witzgromeneirre looked around at them. "You," she said, glancing at Peter, who trembled. "What is the common ingredient found in all Sleeping Draughts?"

"Er…um…" Peter squeaked.

Witzgromeneirre narrowed her eyes. "Clearly. You must be a _Gryffindor, _by all standards," she said in a voice dripping with disgust. "Sit down, boy. And if I call you again and you don't have an answer, it will cost your house more points."

Peter gulped and sank back to his seat. "She's horrible," he told them, his lips quivering.

"Oh, stop acting like a big baby, Pete," Sirius said, rolling his eyes. "Everybody knows that the common ingredient is beetle eyes, it's not the main one because there are different ingredients that would suggest how complex the potion is—"

"OK, we know now already, just shut up Mr. Ace Potions Master," Lily said sardonically.

"Why, thank you for complimenting my strengths, Lil," Sirius deadpanned.

"Pettigrew!" Witzgromeneirre barked.

Peter shot up like an arrow. "Yes, Professor?" he said.

"Why is it that beetle eyes, though common among all the draughts, are not the main ingredient?" she demanded him.

Peter glanced sideways at Sirius. "Because…uh…because different draughts have different levels of complexity, therefore the main ingredient depends on how each one is stronger than the other," he replied.

Witzgromeneirre didn't look satisfied. "Black, you were muttering the answer to him. Five points from Gryffindor."

"What?!" Sirius blurted out, standing up. "I didn't do any such thing, Professor!" Normally Sirius didn't mind if teachers took points from him, but this one, just like all that Ridgewood had done before, was going too far.

"I saw what I saw, Black. Now take your seat." Sirius didn't budge. "Sit _down, _Black!" Witzgromeneirre exploded. 

"Give me proof that I told Peter the answer while he was reciting," Sirius said stubbornly. 

"If you don't take your seat, I will give you detention!" Witzgromeneirre said in a level tone. 

"Give me proof first," repeated Sirius.

"DETENTION! I have never seen a student behave so obstinately!" she shouted.

Sirius smirked. "I don't care. I get five detentions a day—"

"AND I'LL GIVE YOU TEN MORE IF YOU DON'T SIT DOWN THIS INSTANT!!!" she raged. Her pretty face was red with anger.

"That's fine by me. The more the better," Sirius said brightly, obviously enjoying their professor's lack of control.

"OUT! OUT OF THIS CLASSROOM! YOUR HEADMASTER SHALL HEAR OF THIS, YOU MARK MY WORDS!!!" she screamed, pointing a finger at the door.

Sirius willingly marched out. "Goody, it's about time I visited old Dumbledore again. We've been close friends since second year," he said, just to blow Witzgromeneirre up more. 

Witzgromeneirre strode to the door and slammed it behind him. "If any of you," she said in a dangerous tone, staring around at the class, "act the way Black just did today, I will make it certain that the punishment will be very severe."

The whole class listened silently. "For this day we shall learn how to make a more complex Sleeping Draught, though not the most potent one which is the Draught of Living Death. The potion we shall produce should take effect for ten hours or so. Any student who does not fulfill this requirement in his or her potion shall do the honors of making the antidote for the whole class, which, I guarantee you, is extremely difficult to prepare," she said with a sort of villainous smile. 

"What a bitch," Celeste remarked in a low voice to them.

"Shhh," Lily shushed. "If she hears you she'll probably add poison to your draught…" 

"Hell, I wouldn't drink any potion made in this class," said Celeste. "Let's just see if she can make me…"

"I will put all of you in pairs to work on the potion. Let me see…" she looked at the list of students on the roll of parchment marked "Attendance." Her lips curled into a smirk. "Yes. Gryffindors to Slytherins."

All the Gryffindors groaned.

"Now then, Pettigrew, you work with Nott," she said first, eyeing Nott, who must be three times wider than Peter. Peter whimpered as he went over to Nott's place.

"Rosier, you work with Schoharie, and Potter, I think you should go with Avery…" Both Celeste and James glared at their partners in greeting. Avery looked much more displeased with the partner arrangements than James himself. Of course, it was probably because James scared him too much with all the hexes he did to him last year.

"This is better than Snape, but if he's paired with Lily…" Celeste said worriedly. 

Fortunately (if you could call it that) Lily was paired with a skinny new Slytherin girl whose face looked extraordinarily like a chipmunk (an evil chipmunk, of course -_-). 

"Miss Gilchrist and Miss Bulstrode…" Witzgromeneirre continued. And then she said the thing the marauders dreaded the most. "Snape. You go with…" she looked at her attendance sheet. "Miss Tarlise."

"_No,_" Celeste whispered. Lily and Remus threw disgusted looks at Snape, and James gave him a "touch her and you die" expression. It was most probably because Sirius wasn't there to do it, but Chase was still one of his friends, and she _was _kind enough to let him sort things out with his problem before saying anything to Lily or Damaris.

Snape ignored them; in fact, he appeared to be quite pleased. He had had a crush on Chase ever since they first met, but he tried to hide it by attacking her with hexes too whenever there was a marauder-Slytherin brawl. Everybody could see right through him, though.

Chase took a seat next to Snape, looking slightly ill. But when the marauders gave her sympathetic glances, she rolled her eyes and mouthed, "I'll live." 

Witzgromeneirre wasn't done yet. "This potion will take about a month and a half to brew, so I suggest that you spend a bit of your free time with your partners to work on your potions." Everybody groaned, including the Slytherins. Being paired with opposing Houses was enough, but giving up two hours during weekends to sit down for a project _without _starting a fight…now this was simply too much. Snape's grin widened. 

"For now, you should copy—" The door banged open, and a smug-looking Sirius came in. 

"Professor Dumbledore said that I'm allowed to be in class," he announced, apparently not noticing the sullen looks all around. He showed Witzgromeneirre a piece of parchment with Dumbledore's signature on it. Witzgromeneirre had a sour expression on her face. 

"Very well. Your partner is Preston."

Sirius' face fell, and as he went back to his seat to fetch his things, James explained the joint project to him. 

"And she said we have to spend some time with our partners on weekends so that the potion will turn out okay…Avery's a piece of cake, I guess, but Chase wasn't so lucky, she got paired with Snape—"

"_WHAT?!!!_" Sirius shouted. Witzgromeneirre whirled around and said in a peeved voice, "Ten points from Gryffindor, Black!"

Sirius was forced to keep his mouth shut, only settling for giving Snape his worst glare. All throughout the class, Snape kept annoyingly close to Chase, who strained to move as far away from him as their box-sized table would allow. Finally, after fifty-five agonizing minutes, the bell rang and the students rushed to the door, and Professor Witzgromeneirre's announcement of their assignment ("A roll of parchment on how wizards have discovered the Spring of Dreams") was barely heard over the stampeding feet.

"Oh, man, I have to work with that Slytherin girl for ages," Lily moaned as they climbed the stairs to the Great Hall. "She's absolutely horrible, and she smells bad…"

"Stop whining, Lil," Celeste said. "Your problems aren't nearly half as bad as Chase's. Working with Snape…that Witzgromeneirre is positively evil."

"She can't just do that!" Sirius ranted. "Ridgewood always used to say that Snape was 'brilliant' in Potions…shouldn't she take her fellow Slytherin's advice and let him work alone?"

"She's probably just pampering him. She's been voted the Slytherin Head of House, since she's the only former Slytherin in the staff," Rhiannon commented.

Chase shifted her backpack. "I don't see what you're all fussing about. _I'm_ his partner, not any of you."

"But Chase, it's _Snape._" James waved his hands in the air for emphasis. "We're talking about major scum here. Resident oil mine. Certified grade A slimy Slytherin sneak."

"Can we just change the topic?" suggested Remus. "It's not like Snape's going to miraculously act in a civil manner towards her if we talk about his negative traits, no matter how much we like to do so."

"He's right," Celeste agreed as they reached one of the largest staircases among the 142 in Hogwarts. They were going to two different directions at that point. Celeste, Rhiannon, Remus, Lily and James had Arithmancy while Chase, Damaris and Sirius were off to The Study of Ancient Runes. Peter had a free period since he had only CMC and Divination as extra subjects. The others had three.

"See ya guys later," Sirius yelled down the hall to their five retreating friends, his voice reverberating through the corridor. A prefect who was walking near them glared at him as he passed.

Chase and Damaris were chatting already when Sirius turned around to shout at their other friends, and he saw Chase say something to Damaris. Damaris suddenly blushed and walked faster. With Chase strolling in her normal slow ultracool strut, Damaris was easily ten yards in front of her when she reached the Ancient Runes classroom.

_Wonder what that's about, _Sirius mused as he followed Chase in.

*****  

The dungeons were seldom visited by students, since it was cold and dim, a generally unpleasant place. Only the Slytherins, whose common room was like a mini-version of the whole of Hogwarts' underground floors, seemed truly at home in them. A pair of feet's steps echoed down the deserted corridor and stopped at one of the doors that lined the whole hallway. 

Chase stepped inside the seldom-used classroom. It was completely dark except for four lamps in each corner of the room that glowed a green color. A cauldron was already placed on top of a floating flame near the front of the room, and the silhouette of a boy with an extremely large nose stood next to it.

"Good evening, Tarlise," Snape greeted her in a self-righteous tone.

"Well, that's one opinion," Chase muttered, dropping her bag in one of the chairs. She had just been to the girls' dormitory to fetch her Potions ingredients and had just witnessed another make-out scene courtesy of Rhiannon and Sirius.

"You look a little upset today," Snape remarked, opening his Potions book and scanning the recipe for the draught.

Chase sighed. "Really Snape, it's none of your business. Let's just get on with this dumb project."

Snape didn't answer and continued to read his book.

"Jeez, how d'you expect to read anything in here with the classroom this dark?" Chase commented, flicking her wand and causing the lamps to emit a white flame, bathing the room in light. 

Snape shielded his eyes for a moment from the sudden brightness. "Slytherins prefer the dark," he said simply.

"Well then, I wouldn't be surprised if all Slytherins had vampire blood in them," Chase said under her breath, but Snape's sharp ears caught her words.

"I assure you, Tarlise, that none of the Slytherins are vampires, or any other Dark creature that your imaginative mind might think up. You should know by now that Salazar Slytherin himself valued purebloods the most."

There was no conversation after that. Chase worked silently, and to Snape's credit, so did he. Only when Chase was literally out the door did Snape speak.

"Tarlise, may I have a word with you?"

Chase stopped and rolled her eyes, turning back to face him warily. "What do you want now?" 

"I've been thinking for quite some time now," he started. "See, it will be much easier to work on our project if we got along. So I suggest that we make a pact."

"That's very mature of you," said Chase indifferently. "But I think we're getting along fine already, so there's no need to be so formal—"

"I'm not just talking about a pact on a month and a half basis, Tarlise," Snape interrupted smoothly. 

An expression of disbelief fleeted across Chase's face. "Are you talking about a _friendship, _Snape?" she asked, her tone taking on an incredulous note, as if Snape just told her to seriously jump off a cliff.

"Well…technically, yes," Snape answered hesitantly. "But fine, if you want this project to be a disaster, and ruin our grades, then don't tell me I didn't suggest a better option—"

"You make it sound like a tragedy or something," Chase sighed. "All right, Snape. But there have to be certain conditions before I accept the pact."

"Like what?" Snape asked.

"First of all, you're not to call Lily a Mudblood," said Chase coldly. Snape paled at this demand, but said nothing. "Second, whenever some of my friends play a prank on you, don't include those who weren't in on it on your revenge. And no extreme physical damage to those who did."

"You're asking for quite too much for that, Tarlise," Snape said softly. "If that is how you will agree to the pact, then I must make some conditions of my own. I will consent to your second condition if you and your friends do the same for the Slytherins."

"Fine by me. Third, and most importantly, we _will _have a truce, but we are totally platonic to each other. No misleading thoughts that just because I'm not fighting with you anymore, it means something more than friendship. Agreed, Snape?" Chase said.

This was obviously too much for Snape; he hadn't expected that she would say that. He must have assumed that a friendship would mean that Chase accepted him already, but she had just made it clear that he had to get rid of his crush on her. But, if given the choice, it was better to be on platonic terms with Chase (though Chase had already made sure of that even when they were rivals) and be her friend, than have a futile crush on her as her enemy.  "I guess so," he said, looking a bit disappointed. He stretched out his hand. 

Chase, for a moment, narrowed her eyes suspiciously. "If this is just a joke you're playing on me…"

"I assure you, it isn't," Snape insisted, and there was no malice behind his voice. He was, unbelievably, telling the truth. The look in his face was so earnest, Chase nearly had the idea that this was just an impostor using Polyjuice Potion. Snape _never_ showed facial expressions beyond contempt, hatred, amusement or malevolence. At least, not to the three other houses that he and his other fellow Slytherins made fun of.  "So. Truce?"

Chase nodded and shook his hand. "Truce."

Funny. His hand didn't feel as slimy as the marauders often insisted it was.

*****  

**AN – **So there you have it. Chase and Snape are friends. And sorry if this chapter was so Chase-centered, I don't have much time to think of the scenes in this chapter with the third quarter exams less than a month away… Sigh… I swear I'm in a time warp. Only a few weeks ago I was taking the second quarter exams and now here's the continuation of the nightmare… Anywayz, review! If somebody makes my day by reviewing then I may just tear myself from my books (and I don't think that it will take much hassle to do so, since studying is boring beyond belief ^_^) and work on the next part. Thanx. 


	4. When Friends Feud

Complications 

**By Dimantrien**

**AN – **Sorry if I haven't updated in so long! But I finished my exams now, thank God! I think I can do a lot more now while I've still got time on my hands… thanks to everyone who reviewed!

**Chapter 4: When Friends Feud **

Lily hurried to the lake as fast as she could, cursing Witzgromeneirre for her stupid Potions project. The Slytherin girl, Roxanne Boyd, disagreed with her in every little thing and was such a major bitch. Lily was at the point of deciding to curse her no matter how big the chances were that the little brat would tattle to Witzgromeneirre when she remembered that James asked to meet her by the oak tree beside the lake.

"Bloody hell, if James didn't ask me to come there I could've given that Slytherin scumbag an extra eye or two, but—" she started to mutter as she neared the lake, but she saw James standing there and stopped.

She ran over to him, considerably brightening. James never failed to cheer her up when she was in a bad mood with the Slytherins; even just looking at him made her feel happy. 

James' back was turned, but he heard Lily's footsteps and turned around.

"Hey!" Lily greeted, smiling brightly. Her grin faded when she saw the look on James' face. It positively screamed, "I've got bad news."

"Hello Lily," James said, not quite in his confident-and-mischievous tone. His face was pale and the usual gleam in his eyes was missing.

Lily sensed that something bad was up. "What happened? Is anything wrong?" she pressed, her brow creasing in concern. She took his hand, which was slightly cold. She knew that James was only like that when something was bothering him.

James cleared his throat, looking extremely nervous. He opened his mouth but no sound came out.

"You can tell me," Lily said gently. 

"I—this is really hard to say…" James muttered, but Lily heard him. 

"Come on, James, I can listen," Lily urged. Whatever was bothering him, he could tell her. Didn't he realize that? Or maybe the problem he had was really big. _Whatever it is, _she thought, _I'll be there for him. He's always been there for me, so I have to help him too when he goes through a rough spot. _

James was still silent, as if he was considering telling Lily or not.

"James? Come on, it can't be that serious, right?" Lily asked, smiling again. She was trying to lighten the mood, but to no avail. "Just tell me." She waited. She was ready to help him through this no matter what.

James took a deep breath. "I want to break up," he blurted out.

Lily's heart shattered. _That _she hadn't expected.

*****  

"Checkmate!" Rhiannon exclaimed.

Sirius groaned. "No, not again…" he moaned.

"Ha! I beat you twelve times already Sirius. Give it up!" Rhiannon's blue eyes twinkled.

Sirius pretended to look dejected, his head down. "I just can't take losing to a girl…" he lamented mock-dramatically, laying an arm across his forehead and looking up at the ceiling. For the past two hours the two of them were bored out of their minds and bored themselves even further playing chess.

Rhiannon shook her head and slapped his arm playfully. "You're pathetic. I'm going to the kitchens to eat." She got up and went to the portrait hole, but it suddenly opened and Chase and Celeste emerged.

"Hey," Rhiannon said brightly to the two of them.

"Hi," Celeste replied, and Chase lifted her chin slightly in greeting. "What have you been doing all this time?" asked Celeste.

"Kicking Sirius' ass in wizard chess," Rhiannon answered. "All that thinking made me hungry. Wanna come with me to the kitchens?" she offered.

Chase shook her head before Celeste could respond. "I don't think Celeste would like that. She'd be too traumatized if she gained even a single pound more in two hours—"

"Excuse me, but I am _not _that shallow!" Celeste snapped, looking annoyed.

Chase smirked. "Well, are you saying that you're going to come with her?"

"Are you kidding? Of course not! I can't afford to gain another pound—"

"Like that wasn't what I was saying just a second ago," Chase countered, rolling her eyes at her twin.

"Why are you always trying to get on my nerves?" said Celeste.

"Because I find it amusing when my straight-A twin answers irrationally to my more sarcastic comments about her physical appearance," Chase replied innocently.

"More sarcastic comments? My dear Chase, if your usual cynical one-liners were any more sardonic, I doubt _anybody _could put up with your attitude," Celeste scoffed.

"I appreciate your concern for my social welfare, but really, I can manage well by myself," Chase responded, amused. 

Celeste shook her head and walked off, muttering about how someone had to remind her why she liked having a twin.

Chase noticed Sirius and Rhiannon staring at her, and assumed that they had probably listened in on the whole bickering session. She shrugged at them and said, "PMS." With that, she followed the steps that her sister took to the girls' dormitory.

After Rhiannon left, Sirius started packing up his chess set, and the portrait hole burst open again. The sound of sobs erupted from the entrance.

Sirius looked at the direction of the sobbing and was shocked that it was Lily who was crying. He rushed over to her.

"Lils! What happened? Why are you crying?" he asked, frantically searching his pockets for a tissue. He found a whole roll of it (pranksters carry everything J) in his robes and tore off a piece, handing it to Lily.

Lily just sobbed more, ignoring the tissue that he was offering. Barely a second later there was a thundering of footsteps in the direction of the girls' staircase and Chase appeared, looking worried. "I heard somebody crying—Lily! What's wrong?" She, like Sirius, ran to her friend.

Sirius was absolutely baffled, as if he didn't know how to act in situations like this. Chase wrapped an arm around Lily's shoulder and led her to one of the armchairs by the fire.

"C'mon, Lil. Tell us what happened." Chase took the tissue that was still in Sirius' hand and gave it to Lily. Lily wiped her eyes, but it was no use, tears were still overflowing from them.

She said something in a hoarse whisper that Chase and Sirius couldn't make out. 

"What? Sorry, I couldn't hear you…" Sirius said, ripping off another tissue piece from the roll.

Lily leaned closer to Chase. "J-james dumped me," she said again, in a low and shaky voice that only Chase could hear. 

"He did what?!" Chase exclaimed.

"Who did what?" Sirius said impatiently. 

Chase was about to reply when Lily gave her a look that said, "Don't tell him." She nodded and started to help Lily up.

"Aren't you going to tell me?" Sirius demanded, trotting beside them as they headed for the dorm. "I mean you _can_ trust me. I'm not going to blab it to the whole school."

Chase gave him a wry smile and just shook her head. "Some other time Sirius." The two of them started to climb up the stairs. "Later."

"Gee, after a year of friendship, you two sure are still distrusting," he called after them.

"And he claims he isn't a bigmouth," Chase said sardonically to Lily. Lily would have cracked a smile at that, but at the moment any form of slight cheerfulness just couldn't be squeezed out of her.

"I'm willing to bet that as soon as we enter the room, Celes' exact words will be 'Omigod! Lily, what happened to you?!'" Chase imitated Celeste's slightly higher-pitched voice. She opened the door and let Lily come in first. 

"Omigod, Lily! What happened to you?" 

Chase rolled her eyes, flopped down on her bed and watched Lily intently. 

Celeste pulled out a box of tissues from her trunk and tossed it at Lily. "OK. Spill."

"Well look at you, in full gossip mode. Could you at least make your tone of voice sound at least slightly less eager?" Chase remarked.

Celeste glared at her. "How do you want me to act? 'Oh Lily, dearest, we all lament the ordeal that you have yet to explain! Please, for your sake, tell us what is bothering your troubled heart!'" she intoned in an overly-concerned tone.

Chase laughed herself off her bed. She emerged at the side of it a few moments later, clutching her stomach. "Now _that _sounds like your usual melodramatic self," she gasped, still fighting off laughs. "I was beginning to get worried that you ate something that made you more crabby and less dramatic."

"You are just such a—" Celeste began to retort, but Chase waved her hand.

"Ah, shut up for a sec, will you dearest sis… Something's bothering Lily, and all we can do is snipe at each other." 

The moment she uttered those words, Lily broke out into another wave of tears. Celeste's face softened and she sat beside Lily, patting her back. "There, there. What happened?"

"James broke up with her," Chase said quietly when Lily didn't respond. Celeste gasped aloud.

"He didn't," she said disbelievingly.

"Right. And Lily's an award-winning actress playing the role of the broken-hearted ex-girlfriend," Chase answered sarcastically. 

"But why?" Celeste argued. "There wasn't even a problem. They were getting along well until yesterday…" She noticed Chase recline slightly, looking a little ill. Celeste stared at her beadily. "Spit it out, Chase. You know something."

"Gee, what makes you say that?" asked Chase, her tone cynical. But when her eyes landed on Lily, who was looking at her in a hopeless sort of way, she felt guilty that she had kept it at the back of her mind all this time.

"James and I _had_ been getting along," Lily said slowly. "And he wouldn't just dump me for no reason. You always know what's going on with everyone, Chase. Please. Tell me." Her voice was stronger, but it seemed that another blow would make her break into tears again. Chase couldn't drop another bombshell on her. But she couldn't lie to her either.

"Okay," Chase said quietly, and she took a deep breath. "You remember a few days ago, when James was tutoring Damaris?"

Celeste's mouth dropped open in shock, but Lily just nodded since she was in front of Celeste and couldn't see her reaction. She still hadn't put two and two together. 

Chase wished she had just gotten it like Celeste did so that she wouldn't break the news directly, but there was no other choice. "Well… I thought there wasn't anybody there, since the lights were already out…and…and…"

"And what?" Lily prompted, still not getting the point.

"And… God, Lily, don't make me say it… I walked in on them kissing." She suddenly wished she hadn't said anything, not if she had seen the look on Lily's face beforehand. The completely horrified, beyond shocked and raging look, all mixed into one, on her best friend's face.

"_No,_" Lily said in a trembling voice, shaking her head, "You're-you're kidding me, right? He w-wouldn't…he'd never…" But she still had that expression on her face, and another emotion was added in—denial.

"How could he do that?" Celeste said indignantly, now hugging Lily, who was sobbing into her shoulder. "I thought James would become more decent when Lily and him got together… I really thought he'd change…"

"I don't know if he was confused. Maybe he was," Chase said, shrugging. 

Celeste snorted. "Yeah right. Last year, he was right next to Sirius in the 'Hogwarts' Top Ten Players' list," she scoffed. Chase's face darkened, and Celeste realized that she had said something stupid. Not only did she make Lily feel worse, she had also reminded Chase of the way her relationship with Sirius ended. 

"Maybe we shouldn't talk about this anymore. It's only making Lily feel worse," Chase suggested finally after a long silence. Lily stirred when she said that.

"How come you never told me?" she asked Chase in a surprisingly biting voice. 

"What?" Chase said, blinking at the sudden change in her friend's reaction.

"You said you saw them a few days ago. You should have told me! He'd have had plenty of times to cheat on me by now! I should have had the right to dump _him _since it's all _his _fault anyway! It's not fair—he gets away without a scratch, while I'm the one who gets hurt. And I'm not the one who did the wrong thing in the first place!!!" 

Chase shook her head. "Lily, if I'd been the one to tell you, it wouldn't have been right—"

"Wouldn't have been right? Well, what _is_ right then? Just let James cheat on me without my knowing, just let him get away with it and have a good laugh behind my back? Is it the right thing to do to lie to your best friend to cover up an unworthy boyfriend?!" Lily was in near hysteria.

Chase looked pleading now. "Listen to me, Lil. I _did_ want to tell you, but it would be best if James were the one who did. You deserve to know the truth from him. It would hurt you more if you heard it from someone else."

Lily laughed mirthlessly. "Right. But you don't have to go by that rule. You're my best friend, and best friends are supposed to be there for their friends no matter what. Or at least I thought you were," she added scathingly.

Chase narrowed her eyes. "What's _that _supposed to mean?" she demanded.

"It means this. If you were my friend, then you would have told me. You can't stall things like this, Chase. The more time a lie is kept away from the person who should know it, the more it would hurt. But you probably don't know how that feels, do you?" Lily laughed coldly again. "No, Chase, you're always right, aren't you? You always know what's going on with everybody, and everybody knows that. Everyone just _admires_ you for being wise, for being impartial, for being every single person's _friend_. Even to people who don't deserve your friendship."

"Which people?" Chase asked slowly, balling her hands into fists at her sides. 

Lily hesitated for a moment, but she saw the look on Chase's face and her eyes flashed. "You already know. James and Snape."

"I can understand James, but not Snape. Do you think we're still second years, Lil? Grow up! We're fifteen years old. It's my decision to be mature and halt childish grudges that started because of a bunch of stupid pranks and insults exchanged the first time we met. But if you prefer otherwise, then I wouldn't care. Everybody's different, Lily, and everyone has a right to his or her opinion. I respect yours, so why shouldn't you respect mine?" Chase started pacing the room, staring at the floor as if afraid that if she looked at Lily, she would do something dangerous.

"You think you can manipulate me with all your so-called wise remarks?" Lily scoffed. "It may have worked before, but it's not going to fool me now. Who's the immature one, Chase? You can't control people just by making them believe that you're smarter than them. That trick could work on the Slytherins, but not to me. You've got to stop acting high-and-mighty just because you're a Quidditch player and a top student at the same time—"

"How can you say that about me?" Chase exclaimed, her voice rising. "God, Lily! I was only doing what was best for everybody. What would you have done if I had told you before James did? You would have just said that he was a worthless scum because he didn't even have the guts to say it straight to your face and you heard it from someone else. It doesn't matter if it's from me or anybody, as long as it was from another person, you'd be more offended if that was the case."

"And how would you know which case I'd be more offended of?" Lily retaliated, her porcelain cheeks flushing with anger. "You wouldn't know unless you tried, Chase! That's what's wrong with you, you're so used to people telling you you're always right and all your decisions are the wise thing to do, that it's gotten into your head! Now you think that everything you preach and do is what's right! But it isn't Chase, and that's the truth you just have to accept." Lily turned her back at Chase, folding her arms. Celeste was just watching, her eyes moving from her friend to her sister as if she were a spectator of a heated tennis match. 

Chase stood up, her clenched fists shaking. "I can't believe this. I can't believe you'd think that of me."

"Well, that's because it's true. If you deny it, then that's your problem, not mine," was Lily's only reply.

Chase walked to the door and flung it open; it slammed into the wall with a deafening bang. Just before she went out, though, she said, "I did it because you were my friend, because I knew that you would have felt worse if you heard it from me first. I thought you'd appreciate it, since it was the mature thing to do. Call it wrong, but try to look in the mirror and see if you mean me…or yourself." She said it while gripping the doorknob so tightly that her knuckles turned white. When Lily didn't face her, she stepped out and slammed the door.

***** 

**AN – **Short, wasn't it? That's all I can manage for now, I still have two other stories to update. Guess that's all…review…and (this would probably sound stupid once time passes) Advanced Merry Christmas!


	5. Let the Drama Begin

Complications 

**By Dimantrien**

**Chapter 5: Let the Drama Begin**

Chase stormed out of Gryffindor Tower, not really knowing where she was going. She couldn't believe her ears. How could Lily say those things about her? After all that they've been through, after all the times she had been there for Lily to prove that she was a real friend…and now this? 

She knew, deep down, that Lily only said those things because she was hurting. She knew that Lily didn't mean any of the things she said…or did she? Still, hurt or not, Lily had no right to say those things to her. And for uncountable times, Chase was the one who had the right to get mad but never did, because Lily was her best friend. Now she didn't know if she was right, or if she had just wasted four whole years sacrificing little things and subduing her anger towards someone who didn't really deserve it. Some life.

"Chase! Have you seen Lily?"

Chase didn't turn around at the voice. Besides her anger, with which she couldn't focus on anything else, she recognized who owned that voice. None other than James Potter. She quickened her pace, hoping he'd get the point and leave her alone.

No such luck. She completely forgot the fact that James was a very persistent person, and one of the fastest Seekers Hogwarts had in a good few years. Right now he combined the two to catch up with her. 

"I don't know, James. Leave me alone," she said, annoyed. 

"You've seen her, right? Why? What happened?" James asked, trotting behind her.

Chase whirled around. "What happened?" she scoffed. "Oh, not much. She just cried ten gallons while Celeste and I tried to comfort her, and she bit my head off for not telling her about you and your little escapade sooner. Now she's probably burning all pictures of me and you in her photo albums in a cleansing ritual to rid herself of unworthy people she had ever extended friendship for."

James winced. "I'm sorry. I was going to tell her then, but she ran off as soon as I broke up with her. I didn't mean for her to get hurt…"

Chase rolled her eyes. "Right, James, just keep telling yourself that. If you're trying to reason, go to Lily. She's the one who needs an attitude adjustment, not me," she said sarcastically. James probably had no clue what she was talking about, and just stood there. She stalked away and thankfully, James didn't follow. In fact, he was heading in the opposite direction to follow what she just suggested. 

Friends. Were they for real, or just a fanciful illusion? Chase didn't really know. Somehow she had a feeling it was the latter.

*****  

Remus walked down a corridor after his meeting with his Slytherin partner, Sheridan Laszlo, in Potions. He got along well with Sheridan because he was originally from Zynergrand, but still, a Slytherin was a Slytherin. He wasn't that disappointed though.

He was turning around a corner when he collided with someone. "Oh, sorry," he said, and saw that he had bumped into Rhiannon. Her arms were full of frosted cupcakes, and she had dropped a couple of them. 

"No problem, Remus. Want one?" she offered, holding out a cupcake. 

"Er—no thanks," Remus said politely. "Have you seen James or Sirius anywhere?"

Rhiannon nodded. "I saw James just a while ago. He was talking to Chase in a deserted corridor and Chase seemed angry for some reason. I've never seen her mad, have you?" 

Remus shook his head. Chase, angry? That he had to see…

"And Sirius is probably in the common room. At least, he _was _in the common room before I left. Say, do you mind coming with me there? I still don't know your school well enough, and just a minute ago I leaned on a wall and next thing I knew, I was in this corridor…"

Remus nodded at her request and accompanied her back to the Tower. Rhiannon was a bit talkative, but she was witty and took things lightly so he didn't mind. When they reached the common room, they saw Sirius sitting alone on one of the armchairs by the fire.

"Hey there, Padfoot. What's wrong?" Remus asked, noticing the grave look on Sirius' face.

"Hiya Rem. I was just thinking about something… Lily came in here an hour ago, and she was crying like mad. But she and Chase won't tell me what she's so sad about. Do you know?" 

Both Rhiannon and Remus shook their heads no. "I saw Chase with James earlier, and she looked angry about something. D'you think that has something to do with what happened to Lily?" Rhiannon asked. 

Sirius' eyes lit up. "Hey, yeah! I waited for like ten minutes before a door slammed and Chase came thundering down the stairs looking upset about something.  I asked her but she looked so mad that she didn't answer. Maybe Celeste knows what's going on. She's probably in the dormitory." The other two shrugged and followed him to the girls' dorms.

Celeste let them in. She didn't look too cheerful herself. "Let me guess. You want to know where Lily is, right?" she said wearily. "If you're looking for her, she just left—"

"No, we're not looking for Lil," Sirius interrupted. "I want to know why she was crying and why Chase was mad and why Chase, according to Rhiannon, looked angry with James—" Then his eyes widened as he realized what he just said. 

Celeste raised an eyebrow. "Figured it out already, haven't you? Come on in and I'll explain the whole story…" She looked exhausted. When they were all settled on the beds, she started to tell them all about the breakup. Remus looked like he was torn in between wanting to go out and comfort Lily or catch up with James and help him not to be confused. Sirius' mouth was hanging open and he appeared not to believe a single word of what Celeste had just said. Rhiannon had dropped all the remaining frosted cupcakes she hadn't eaten yet without noticing. 

"But—but… Damaris would never do something like that," Rhiannon said earnestly. "If she did, then she probably didn't know that James had a girlfriend or something. There has to be a reasonable explanation."

Celeste flipped her hair back angrily. "Reasonable? You call James cheating on Lily reasonable? It's not fair! Lily should give him a good kick in the—"

"Celes," Remus said warningly. He didn't want Lily to be as hurt as she was, yet he couldn't be mad at James either. After all, James was one of his best friends. Celeste didn't seem to want to keep silent about this.

"Oh, sure, take his side. He may be your friend Remus, but if he did the wrong thing, it's your job to straighten him out. He should realize that he—"

"Come on, do you expect Rem not to side with his best friend? No offense Celes, but we've known James longer than Lily, so it's instinct to help him straighten things out. I care about Lil too, but frankly, I don't think we're going to be much help since girls are better listeners anyway, or so they say." Sirius crossed his arms over his chest.

"But he did the wrong thing!" Celeste cried. 

"There might be a reason behind it, like Rhiannon said. Maybe one of them was just confused," Remus suggested.

"Wait, wait, wait. I remember that in cases like this, where we're friends with both of the broken-up couple, we're not supposed to take sides…" Rhiannon said vaguely, looking at the ceiling as if imploring to it for answers.

"Exactly. Celeste, Sirius' idea isn't totally off base. Girls _are_ better listeners, and she can relate to you because you're a girl yourself," Remus said with a smile. None of them could object to that. "Sirius and I will look for James and try to coax him into telling why the hell he did something stupid. Meanwhile, you and Rhiannon go to Lily and calm her down." 

For once, Celeste didn't seem to find anything wrong with the picture. "O-okay. But, if James admits a reason that isn't considered rational, then you better talk some sense into him and threaten him to apologize to Lily sincerely—"

"_Only _if you stop Lily from bad-mouthing all of the male gender once she talks to you," Remus returned.

Celeste cracked a smile and shook Remus' outstretched hand. "Deal."

Sirius sighed. "Why is it that when we have to scurry around fixing our friends' love lives, it's convenient that we are also friends with the one they broke up with?" he groaned.

"Because we're too lucky," Remus answered sarcastically. "Now get your butt off the bed. We need to find James. And if we're even luckier, we wouldn't need to whack him upside the head."

Sirius stood up and glanced pointedly at Celeste. "Celes would love that." 

*****  

Lily sat under a tingelid tree, a magical specie whose leaves changed color depending on the temperature surrounding it. Right now, since it was a cold day, the leaves were a bright blue. She loved this spot. It was a bit far from the castle, on the grounds. She remembered last year when she had a fight with Celeste and she and Chase were under this tree. Celeste had come and the two explained to her that they had set up the fight to… 

To make her admit that she had feelings for James and to get them together.

She closed her eyes and groaned. Why was it that wherever she went, there was always something that reminded her of James? If this was a week ago she wouldn't have minded. But now that _he _dumped _her _because he cheated on her with a supposed new friend of theirs, the always-reminded-of-him factor was becoming a major pain in the whatchamacallit. 

A cool wind blew around the tree, causing the leaves to flash a much paler blue before the breeze passed. Standing up, Lily just wished that she had an off switch in her brain that would cause her _not _to be reminded of James in every little thing. She started running back to the castle, passing by the Whomping Willow.

And rammed right into another person. 

"Ow…oh, excuse me, sorry," Lily mumbled, but when she looked up, she jumped back practically ten feet and glared at the attacker. It was James.

"Uh…sorry," James muttered, averting his eyes. Lily started to walk away.

"Wait!" James called after her. Lily wouldn't wait, and Lily wouldn't follow an order that a jerk like him dared to command. She broke into a run.

"Come on, Lil, please. I have to explain this to you. Just give me a minute—" The fact that the volume of his voice wasn't decreasing as she ran meant that he was following her. 

_Just go away. Go away, go away, go away. _Lily blinked a few times to prevent any unnecessary tears from spilling. How dare he come after her after what he did? How dare he even think that she would give him even a minute of her time when he was the one who did the wrong thing? And only two hours after the breakup, too. 

She felt a hand come down on her shoulder and slapped it away. "Leave me alone," she choked out in a raspy voice, giving away what she was feeling that moment—the feeling that she just wanted to cry her eyes out. Well, damn James for being the reason why she was like that at the moment.

"Please, Lily. You deserve an explanation. I know that you're thinking that I don't deserve a minute of your time but this is really important," James said. 

Damn James too for knowing her too long to read her mind practically to the letter. "What part of _Leave me alone _don't you understand?" she said bitingly, stepping away from him. 

"Just listen for a minute. I didn't even know that Damaris didn't know we were a couple—"

Lily stared daggers at him. "Right. Blame it on somebody else, James. Then again, I'm not saying I don't hate her guts either. Just tell your _friend _to keep away from me if she values her life, and if you knew any better, you should too." 

"But I swear, she didn't know! And I didn't know that she would kiss me either—"

"Will you stop acting like a major git! Even if you didn't know, then how come you chose her?! If it was just a tiny _mistake, _then how come I was the one you dumped?" Lily's voice was dangerously low, and she gripped the wand in her pocket tightly. 

James chose unwisely to be silent. 

"You know what? Don't bother answering. I don't even know why I gave in to your request to listen to you. You don't even have a valid reason of why you dumped me! And if you really were that superficial from the start, James Potter, I'd wonder where my brain had gone when I even thought of getting together with you!" 

It was then that James stirred. "I know, Lily. But I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to hurt you, but I didn't want to hurt Damaris either. Professor McGonagall told me she had a personal problem that's really serious. It's like if anybody says the wrong thing to her or something, she'd break down. So I figured that the best way was to just stay neutral and pick neither."

Lily couldn't believe what she was hearing. "And you value a complete stranger's welfare above mine? If she's got a _problem_, then it's not your responsibility to solve it for her. And I don't see what I did so wrong that you chose to affect _our _relationship with being Damaris' buddy. Unless I'm mistaken, which I know I'm not, I never did anything to deserve this. You're the one who screwed up. I pity whoever falls in love with you. They obviously wouldn't know what a lying scum you are." 

James' eyes flashed for a moment. "Will you think about what you're saying? The girl has a serious problem. Even McGonagall told me to be careful. I'm just doing what I think is best for everybody. I still care about you a lot, Lily, but right now we have to make sacrifices. And yes, I'm willing to make sacrifices even to a complete stranger if I know that she deserves something to make her life better for once. I'm not going to get together with her. Why are you so paranoid?"

"Why am I so paranoid? The fact that your boyfriend breaks up with you when you didn't do anything to cause it is enough to make any girl paranoid! You just don't get it, James! You don't get how it feels to be the person being dumped, because you're too high and mighty to be reduced to a pathetic person who knows how it feels to be rejected! You've always been the one who dumps girls and not the other way around. And in this case, rejection isn't justified, James. You know that." The tears were spilling now, but Lily was beyond caring. She had to let James know how insensitive he could go, how insensitive he'd _become_. He deserved to know what a jerk he'd turned into ever since the Zynergrand students waltzed into their school.

"You, on the other hand, don't know what it's like to sacrifice something for others! I don't care how much your parents spoil you at home because you're a Muggle-born witch, Lily, or how much fame you have that you're so used to people just following what you want them to do and hand everything to you. Pardon me if I think being charitable every now and then is a good idea if you believe that helping others is just a load of crap." James' hands were balled up into fists.

"Me? Since when have I been overly selfish? Is that really how you thought of me when we were together? That I'm just a spoiled brat who's so used to having the best of everything?! If that's the case, then you don't know me well enough, James! You don't have the right to say those things about me," Lily retorted, wiping her tears away angrily. "You don't have a right to insult me like that. _You're_ the one who started this mess, and I'm not going to stand here and let you do as you please when you know very well that this is all your fault." 

Lily whirled around in blind fury and stalked away from the person she thought understood her better than an open book. She had thought that after last year, he had finally begun to change. She had thought that he was going to stop being a player and become mature just like everyone else. 

How very wrong she was.

*****  

**AN – **The usual, sorry I'm late, dunno if you think this is a sucky chappie, still have two other stories to update, blah blah blah. I've been having severe writer's block lately and all I can do is read other people's works to bully myself into thinking of something brilliant… unfortunately none yet as of now… Besides, all the fics I've been reading are Saiyuki and not HP, so that doesn't help either ^^;; And now I'm considering writing a Saiyuki fic. Does anybody have a cure for multi-fic syndrome? 


	6. Arguments and Misgivings

Complications 

**By Dimantrien**

**Chapter 6: Arguments and Misgivings **

The girls' dormitory was oddly quiet. It was 9:00 in the evening, and Celeste was pretending to read a fashion magazine, Lily was rechecking her homework, and Chase was just lying in her bed, unable to sleep. Kylie, Sylvia, Rhiannon and Damaris, the four other occupants of their dorm room, were still downstairs (like every other Gryffindor who didn't fancy turning in so early on a Friday) in the common room.

After ten more minutes of mute silence, Celeste threw her magazine to the floor. "Oh, this is stupid! Can't anybody say something?!" 

Chase looked at her, nonplussed by her very un-Celeste-like outburst. "You always did say that I should keep my mouth shut once in a while so that I wouldn't get the urge to bicker with you, sis," she said, then turned back to her mind-numbing task of staring at the ceiling of her four poster.

"I never said that you should act like you've had your tongue cut out," Celeste shot back. She wasn't really angry at her sister, quite the contrary, she was actually relieved that Chase was answering back and breaking the silence.

"Well, if that were the case, then at least Melodrama Girl over there would be happy. I wouldn't be able to do any _wiseass preaching _if I didn't have a tongue," Chase responded, her voice dripping with sarcasm as she shot a pointed look at Lily.

Celeste sighed. "You know that's not what I meant, Chase."

A shuffling of parchments was heard then, and Lily stood up, her homework neatly rolled in her hands. "Don't bother persuading Chase that she's wrong, Celes," she said. "You can't correct someone who's already too perfect—or so she thinks." She glared coldly at her ex best friend. 

Celeste shook her head, then put her hands over it, as if she were nursing a severe headache. "This is pointless," she muttered to herself. "You know, you two could at _least _act civilly to each other," she pointed out in a louder voice.

"Like that's going to change anything," Lily scoffed. Again, silence.

Celeste didn't know what to do. The tension in the room was so thick, she was dying to pull either Lily or Chase out of the dormitory and drag her to the common room so that they could both cool their heads. But that was the problem. If she left one of them alone, then that meant she took the side of the other. And if she just stayed here, driving herself mad in the silence, they weren't going to get anywhere. 

The only other option was stalking out of the room alone, and both Lily and Chase would think that she didn't care about them and their fight at all, which would only make them mad at _her. _She was definitely stuck in indecision, and worse, none of them would produce a positive outcome. She wished that one of the other girls would come up, then at least she could talk to someone. Anyone.

As if answering her plea, the door slowly started to swing open. She breathed a sigh of relief. _There is a god, she mentally cheered. The person stepped in, and Lily and Chase looked up imperceptibly._

And instantly, Celeste's hopes deflated, the color drained from Lily's face, and Chase sighed then buried her head in her pillow, muffling an almost inaudible groan. 

Damaris stood pale-faced in the doorway. 

*****  

"Okay, okay, we totally understand," Sirius reassured his best friend. James had just come into the dormitory, and it had been a half hour since they had given up looking for him. As soon as he had entered the room he had launched into an explanation about the reason of his and Lily's breakup. 

"You do? You mean, you're not mad at me?" James asked doubtfully. 

"_Yes," Sirius said exasperatedly, exchanging an annoyed look with Remus. Peter nodded vigorously._

Remus, who was lying on his stomach on his four poster, leaned forward. "So, you're saying that you tried to talk to Lily about what you just told us, but she just blew up at you?" he prompted. 

James just nodded miserably. "D'you think she'll ever forgive me?" 

Sirius let out a low whistle. "I dunno, Prongs. It sounds like you really screwed things up big time," he commented bluntly.

"Sirius," Peter warned. Remus showed his agreement by narrowing his eyes at Sirius.

"Ah…what I meant was…you—er, screwed things up enough for her not to talk to you for several…erm…uh…until the distant future," Sirius tried to explain, looking uneasy.

Remus sighed. "What our inarticulate friend is trying to say is… We don't think Lily'll forgive you anytime soon," he interpreted sympathetically to the dejected James.

"We're doing the best we can, and Celeste said she'd help calm Lily down, if that makes you feel better," Peter added hastily. James was the one who trusted him the most and was always there for him, and he wanted to do the same. 

This statement seemed to perk James up a little, and Remus gave Peter a grateful smile. Right at that moment, the door banged open, slamming against the wall and swinging back because of the force, and Celeste stormed in, looking pissed. 

The marauders stared at her, too surprised to move. Then Sirius raised his eyebrows. "Furious much?" he said tentatively, looking at the dent that the doorknob made on the wall at Celeste's entrance. 

Celeste completely ignored him, then sat down on the only other bed in the room that was unoccupied at the moment. "I can't believe those two," she fumed. 

Remus scooted beside her and put an arm around her shoulder. "Okay, calm down. What happened?" 

The gesture seemed to make Celeste relax slightly, and she looked less tense. "It's Lil and Chase. I'm just so sick of them not talking to each other. I was trying to make them get along a few minutes ago and they just insulted each other—"

"That isn't so bad," Peter piped up, obviously thinking that Celeste was being way too dramatic as usual. "You should just let them cool off for a few—"

"I'm not yet finished," Celeste snapped. "After I thought they would be finished mocking each other, Damaris entered the room." At those words, James' face paled. "To make matters worse, Lily went off on Damaris and Chase said something that made Lily even madder. It was horrible, they both lost it and started to hex each other—Damaris got caught in the crossfire and had to go to the infirmary, and I only just got away." 

"What did Chase tell—?" Sirius asked eagerly, but Remus shot him a look and he stopped mid-question. 

Luckily, Celeste was too distracted to hear his question and was rubbing her temples. "I had a job hushing it up to the prefects; it wouldn't be any good if they caught Lily doing magic out of class—but it didn't make much difference, everyone in the common room saw Damaris going to the hospital wing with worms sprouting in her hair and half the length of her arms covered in feathers…" 

The guys were silent; Sirius and Peter glanced at James then back at Celeste, looking like they expected her to blow up at him and tell him that it was all his fault that these things were happening. 

But she did nothing of the sort and just took deep breaths before speaking again. "Just in case it might happen again… You guys won't do anything to piss either of them off, right? Right?" 

James was still too distraught to respond, and Sirius appeared to not want to do what Celeste said. Remus and Peter, however, nodded. Peter nudged Sirius.

_"Padfoot," _Remus prompted.

Sirius sighed. "Yeah, okay, but can I annoy them with things that do not concern the current issue?" he asked, grinning.

"Whatever. Anything that can distract them is fine," Celeste said. She looked at her watch. "I think that by now they've either cooled down or hexed each other so bad they can't lift their wands, so it's probably safe for me to go back. 'Night, guys," she said, giving Remus a quick kiss before going out the door.

"It's nice to know that at least one of us doesn't have any girl troubles," James sighed. 

Peter shrugged. "With Celeste, everything's perfect. The perfect grades, the perfect record, the perfect looks, the perfect boyfriend." His eyes suddenly lit up. "Hey James! I just remembered, you won the bet!" 

James blinked, then looked a little relieved that they were finally changing the subject. "What bet?" 

"You know, the one that you told me about last week. You said that if Sirius went after another girl other than Chase, then he'd do your bidding or something like that. Well, I went to the kitchens last Tuesday and I saw him and Rhiannon Thetis kissing!" Peter revealed.

Sirius scowled at Peter. "You said you weren't going to tell anyone about that!" he protested.

Remus snickered. "Sirius, you've never been embarrassed if one of us caught you snogging a girl somewhere before, so why stop now?" 

"Yeah. And now that you've gone back to your old ways, you have to be Prongs's servant for five whole days 'cause you made the deal on a Monday and you made out with a girl on a Saturday," Peter added. He glanced at James. "See? You won!"

But James didn't look that happy at all, in fact, his eyes still held the same glint of sadness as they had when he first went into the dormitory that night. Sirius and Rhiannon's new relationship only reminded him of the fact that his was broken into pieces.

*****  

Rhiannon sat up on her bed when she heard Celeste step into the room. "Oh, it's you. I thought it was another prefect…"

"Where are Lily and Chase?" Celeste asked, plopping onto her own bed. 

Rhiannon gestured at the two mentioned names' respective beds, which had their hangings shut. "Asleep. When Damaris went down and you'd gone to the boys' dormitory, I checked on them. Had to cast Cheering Charms on them to keep them from killing each other."

"Thanks," Celeste said gratefully, relieved that she didn't have to play peacemaker again. "This whole thing is a mess. You don't know how happy I'll be when all their problems blow over…" 

Rhiannon rolled over on her stomach and propped her face up with her hands. "Are you mad at Damaris for kissing James?" she asked tentatively. 

Celeste appeared to be thinking for a moment, then shook her head. "I suppose not. She mustn't really have known they were a couple. But I just can't get why James would dump Lily if there was just a misunderstanding," she added, frowning. "I've been friends with him for a year already, and I thought he'd change and be serious about a girl for once—once he went out with Lily. I don't know what's gotten into him." 

"I think he still loves Lily," Rhiannon remarked thoughtfully. "He wouldn't go after her just to be yelled at if he just broke up with her for fun… But you're right, I don't get why he'd break up with her in the first place." She shook her head and yawned.

"We'll talk more in the morning," Celeste said. "Good night."

"'Night," Rhiannon answered sleepily as she swished her wand to turn out the lights.

*****  

Classes resumed the next day. Celeste was fed up with her best friend and her twin's coldness towards each other and tried not to be in the same room as the two of them when they were together—except classes, of course. This behavior of hers seemed to have diffused Chase somewhat, and she didn't initiate any arguments with Lily anymore, which was well, because Lily was now refusing to talk to her, James and Damaris. 

It was no different in Potions, where Professor Witzgromeneirre instructed the Slytherin-Gryffindor pairs to work on their Sleeping Draughts. For once, Lily was relieved that they were paired with the Slytherins instead of their friends, and went over to Roxanne Boyd, who looked rather surprised that Lily didn't greet her with a scowl. Chase shared the same relief as Lily did—not only was the table she was working in far from Lily's, she and Snape were already friends. 

"What's up with you?" Snape asked Chase as they were pounding beetle eyes. Chase had just been to the front to get ingredients that they didn't have on their school list, and she and Lily had a particularly long glaring fight before she went back. She had a sour look on her face when she got back to their table.

Chase scrutinized Snape as he questioned her, debating whether she should tell him about her problems or not. She decided she should answer him. Who else was she going to confide in? Celeste refused to take sides, and the marauders weren't exactly good at solving personal problems. Rhiannon seemed closest to Celeste and would probably agree with her not to take sides, and she didn't think it was wise to confide in Damaris either, as she caused the reason for Chase and Lily to fight in the first place. Snape seemed to be her only friend who didn't have anything to do with the conflict.

"You don't have to tell me if you don't want to," Snape said uncertainly.

Chase sighed. "No, it's okay. It's just that Lily and I had a fight, and it doesn't look like we're going to be best buds again anytime soon," she explained, rolling her eyes as if to let Snape know that it wasn't too big a deal. 

"You and Evans had a fight?" Snape repeated, glancing across the room at Lily, then back at Chase. "Why?"

"She and James broke up recently. I knew the reason why James dumped her before the actual breakup and apparently, she thinks I'm a heartless non-friend because I didn't tell her until after they broke up. When I tried to reason with her, she just said that I'm a smart aleck" Chase frowned, remembering their fight. 

"If anyone's to be blamed it's Potter, since he was the one who broke up with her in the first place," Snape remarked, his eyes glittering malevolently as he looked over at James and Avery. "Though I wouldn't be surprised that he did, seeing as Evans is a Mu—"

Chase raised an eyebrow at him, giving him a look that clearly said "You promised not to call Lily a Mudblood."

"A Muggleborn," Snape finished hastily. 

"Why would James not want to date Lily because she's Muggleborn?" Chase demanded, even though she knew that Snape would probably say that witches of Muggle parentage weren't worthy to be respected by purebloods. 

Snape was quiet for a moment. "Well, as far as I remember, all the girls that Potter dated before Evans were purebloods," he answered finally, and as Chase mentally recounted all of James's previous girlfriends, that was true.

"I suppose…" Chase said slowly. "Listen, Severus, I know you're a Slytherin and all, and even if I'm not very fond of Lily right now, I still don't like it when people call her a Mudblood."

"I know," Snape said. "But it's hard to forget—I mean, I'll try not to next time," he promised, though there was a look in his eyes that said that this vow was very painful to keep. He was, after all, a Slytherin.

Chase rolled her eyes. "You make it sound like you're going to be thrown into Azkaban if you say 'Muggleborn' instead of 'Mudblood.' But let's just say that's the last of my goody-goody requests; if Lily found out about this she'd probably worm in a reason to say that I'm a wannabe-omniscient who knows what's best for everyone and bosses them around to do it," she deadpanned.

Snape smirked at the remark as he stirred their potion. "If she did that, I'll gladly tell her that she's just jealous that you're more sensible than Perfect-Straight-A-Superior-IQ Evans."

Chase smiled. "Couldn't agree with you more."

*****  

"Hey Padfoot," Remus greeted Sirius, who had followed him to the front of the classroom where he was picking out ingredients.

"Black, I do believe that you and Preston have gotten your fair share of water from the Spring of Dreams, and there is no reason for you to come back here to get some more," Professor Witzgromeneirre said irritably. 

Sirius just gave her a (fake) saccharine smile. "Professor, I just got the measurement wrong and I wish to make it exact so as to perfect this excellent project that you have assigned us students," he said innocently. 

Professor Witzgromeneirre scowled at him, but couldn't do anything about it because there was nothing to blame Sirius for, so she walked away and went back to the task of grading the third years' Forgetfulness Potions. 

"So, what did you want to tell me?" Remus asked in a quieter tone, knowing well that Sirius didn't get all sweet and suck-up to a Slytherin teacher unless there was a hidden purpose. 

Sirius glanced around them to check that no one was looking suspicious before talking. "Do you see Chase?" 

Remus scanned the back of the classroom, where Chase and Snape were bent over their potion. He raised his eyebrows at Sirius as if he wasn't being…serious (no pun intended) as usual. "Uh-huh, why, has Chase mysteriously disappeared a few minutes ago?" he inquired dryly.

"Not that, you git, look what she's doing!" Sirius hissed, inconspicuously gesturing at Chase. "Tell me what you see," he added in a calmer voice.

Remus glanced at Chase and Snape again. "I see Chase working on the Sleeping Draught with Snape," he said stupidly, then looked back at Sirius. "Sirius, are you trying to annoy me?!" 

"Oh, come _on, look closer," Sirius seethed in a tone that implied that Remus was trying to be an idiot on purpose. _

Sighing, Remus looked at the pair for the third time, scrutinizing them. Chase was saying something, and Snape patted her on the shoulder. "I don't see anything out of the ordi—" Wait a second. _Snape patted _Chase _on the shoulder???_

"See, _that's what I've been trying to tell you!" Sirius cried, throwing his hands up as Remus goggled at Chase and Snape then back at him. "And look, Chase isn't angry, or annoyed, or disgusted—for Merlin's sake that's __Snape you know! She shouldn't be—" _

"Black and Lupin, I demand that you cease your impromptu deliberation, for goodness' sake, this is Potions, not the Debate Club!" Witzgromeneirre exploded, giving them an extra-special look: the death glare. "If you insist that whatever topic you're discussing is more important than your project, which I doubt, then I suggest you take your conversation outside, along with twenty points from Gryffindor!" 

"Oh, sorry Professor, as much as we'd love to, we don't take points from our House—that's the teacher's department," Sirius responded sweetly, but nevertheless he scurried back to his place beside Preston, and seconds later Remus was back to his and his partner's table. 

"Everything okay, Moony?" James asked Remus concernedly. He was barely doing work; it was much easier to boss Avery around into doing everything for their potion. 

Remus glanced at Snape, who was pointing at the potion and explaining something to Chase (he could tell it was explaining, because Snape had that "I-could-be-the-professor-in-this-class" look on his face). Chase looked at Snape skeptically and Remus could tell that they were disagreeing with each other. It looked like things were back to normal. "Yeah, it is now." 

*****  

Sirius didn't get to talk to Chase on the way to the Ancient Runes classroom, perhaps because of how she mysteriously disappeared once she was out of the dungeons. He figured he could ask her about the being-unnaturally-friendly-with-the-resident-greaseball issue during class, since she couldn't avoid him then. 

He was so busy with his thoughts that he slid into the classroom just in time, as in, two seconds before the late bell. Their professor clapped her hands as Sirius took his seat and said, "Excellent save, Mr. Black." Then she went on to droning about translating more complicated rune symbols, which, in Sirius' opinion, was beyond boring, and he stifled a yawn before remembering what he was supposed to ask Chase.

Locating a spare piece of parchment in his book bag, he scribbled something onto it as unobtrusively as possible and when the professor faced the board to draw some runes, he flicked his wand and made the parchment land three desks to his right, where Chase was sitting. 

Ancient Runes was Chase's best subject, and she was usually serious about taking notes in this class but today she looked oddly disinterested with the lesson and didn't hesitate to open the piece of parchment (their teacher was still filling the board up with symbols and translations). 

**Hey. What's up? –Padfoot– **

Sirius watched Chase read the note, scrawl something on it, and pass it to Patricia McKinney. As soon as the parchment reached him, he unfolded it, not even glancing at the front to see if the coast was clear.

_The sky, the clouds, the ceiling of this classroom that's completely covered with a circular glowing rune chart… Why do you ask? ~Flamefeather~_

(If you remember, Chase is an Animagus too so she's got a nickname that she can use whenever they're passing notes so that the teacher wouldn't know who exactly wrote the notes if ever he or she caught students passing it to and fro. ^_^)

Sirius shook his head amusedly at Chase's reply and repeated the process: scribble, flick, and aim (for Chase's desk).

**I was actually thinking along the lines of anything new that is happening…but I don't deny that your answers were correct, literary-wise, anyway. –Padfoot–**

(I'm just gonna write their conversation without interruptions, as it's easier…-_-)

_I knew you were prodding for something. Why don't you just spit out what you want to ask? ~Flamefeather~_

**Moi****?**** Prodding for information? I can't believe you'd think that of me… Anyway, yes, I do have a question to ask you, but don't you call it nosing around, its proper term is "personal inquiry." –Padfoot–**

_Right… so, pray tell, what are you personally inquiring? ~Flamefeather~_

**Don't blame me for my lively curiosity, but why does it seem that during our Potions class, you were being incongruously amiable towards a particularly oily and greasy piece of scum? –Padfoot–**

_Am I right in assuming that the "particularly oily and greasy piece of scum" is Severus Snape? ~Flamefeather~_

**Know any other particularly oily and greasy pieces of scum? –Padfoot–**

_Fine, I get your point. So what would you do if I said yes, I was being incongruously amiable to him? ~Flamefeather~_

**YOU WERE???! I mean, you can stop using big words now, I just did that to make the implication of hostility less subtle… –Padfoot– **

_Hostility to who? Me or Severus? And no, I wasn't using big words, I was merely copying the phrase you wrote. Wise guy… ~Flamefeather~_

**If I were to be hostile to somebody, who do you think is the more likely target, you or that git? And WHY are you calling him in first name terms??! –Padfoot– PS – I resent your last remark, by the way… **

By now the piece of parchment they were writing on was completely covered, and their teacher finished writing and asked them to copy all of the stuff written on the board. Sirius watched Chase fold the note and shove it into her backpack and extract a new one, along with a roll of parchment for her notes. She seemed to be contemplating what to write. 

Finally, after what seemed like forever, the new piece of paper landed on Sirius' desk.

_If it makes you happier, I'll answer all your questions and any possible ones you're trying to formulate in your little mind right now… First, being polite to Severus is going to make the Potions project a whole lot easier; second, being civil to him obviously requires using his first name. In case you have any objections to me deciding to be friendly with him, let me remind you that this way, I'll be spared hexing sessions whenever we're supposed to work on the potion, so I'd rather act congenial instead of ending up with twitching ears and mutated body parts, thank you very much. Now that I'm sure that I've explained everything you could possibly ask, leave me in peace to copy my notes. ~Flamefeather~_

Sirius spent the better half of the class trying to read between the lines of Chase's note, and his final conclusion was that she forced herself to act civil with Snape so that the Potions project would run smoothly and her grades in Potion wouldn't hover above the toilet—not that they would, because a joint project with a Slytherin ensured that she would get a satisfactory grade. He didn't know why he felt so anxious about her supposed friendship with that git, but it made him uneasy. 

Sure, they were just friends now, but Sirius still felt that lingering attraction to her and the need to protect her. He blinked, remembering the thing he had with Rhiannon; the two of them were so much alike. But Chase was different, and she was a person who considered herself independent and felt insulted when somebody thought she couldn't defend herself and needs another person to do so. Sirius was no exception. 

He could still feel a twinge of anxiety, as if something in her note wasn't right…but Chase wouldn't lie to him, would she? And what reason would she have of not telling the truth? 

Sighing, and trying to get rid of his doubt, he scribbled something on the back of the parchment, crumpled it into a ball, and threw it at Chase's desk.

Just as she finished the last sentence of her notes, Chase smoothed out the parchment and read Sirius' response. She rolled her eyes and smirked, and the bell instantaneously rang at the same time.  

**Yes, it makes me a lot happier that you cleared things up…except for that comment about my mind being LITTLE. –Padfoot–  PS – Let me copy your notes later, I didn't get to jot down a single thing because I was too upset about your _insensitive _comment…you owe me one anyway because of that. **


	7. The World in Reverse

**Complications**

**By: Dimantrien**

**Chapter 7: The World in Reverse**

Dinner at Hogwarts for their group of friends used to be the highlight of their day, but that hadn't been the case ever since Lily and James's breakup. While the marauders and Celeste stayed in their usual place at the middle of the Gryffindor table, Lily was on the right end with the two other (girl) Gryffindor fifth years, Damaris was on the opposite end with Rhiannon, and Chase was nowhere in sight. 

Peter was the one who first noticed her mysterious absence. "Hey, Celes, where's Chase?"

Celeste looked up from her pork chops, her eyebrows furrowing. "Um…I think she's with Snape…"

Sirius dropped the bowl of gravy he'd been holding and its contents spilled all over Remus' food-laden plate. "_She's_ with _Snape?" he said so loudly and incredulously that a few people glanced in their direction. ****_

"That's what I heard… Is that any reason for you to ruin my dinner?" Remus demanded, pointing to his…ruined dinner.

"What's Chase doing with that slime ball?" Sirius went on, ignoring his friend completely.

Celeste rolled her eyes. "Potions project, remember? Why do you care, anyway? Chase can take care of herself without you."

Remus snorted derisively. "As if Padfoot's even capable of taking care of someone else's dinner," he scoffed, indicating his plate, which was a puddle of chicken and pork bits, bread crumbs, ketchup and gravy. 

"Yeah, but why does she have to skip dinner? It's not like she's been so serious about a school project before that she'd decide to miss out on a meal," Sirius argued, waving his fork in the air (which still had a pork chop stuck on it) and causing more bits to rain down on Remus' plate. 

Remus scowled at this observation, grabbed his plate, and switched it with Sirius'. 

"Well, I'm certainly glad that she's starting to set her priorities straight," Celeste remarked in a superior tone. "Goodness knows it took her the better half of five years to improve her study habits."

Sirius finally put down his fork right at the exact moment that it was devoid of any clingy particles of pork chop. "But this is _Snape_ we're talking about. How can Chase stand being with a person who thinks he's the reigning king of Potions, let alone spend her precious feeding time listening to him gloat about his supposedly superior knowledge and letting him order her around—" 

"Oh, give it a rest already, Padfoot," James groaned, which effectively shut Sirius up, as these were the first words his best friend uttered all evening. 

"Fine," Sirius grumbled after his initial surprise, picking up his fork and knife again. "But don't blame me if she ends up in the hospital wing with chicken feathers on her neck or something…" he trailed off, resuming his dinner…or, what he _thought was his dinner. "Hey! Where's my foo—Moony!" _

Said Moony was munching happily on the last bite of Sirius' fried chicken. Swallowing, he said, "Don't worry about being wherever Chase is, Sirius, like I said before, you're not even capable of taking care of someone's dinner—let alone your _own." _

*****  

Lily dragged herself up the stairs leading to the girls' dormitory, groaning. She'd managed to survive another day of acting like everything was fine (except for the part where she wasn't hanging out with the gang), but it was kind of hard since James was in all of her classes. Jeez, he even took all her extra ones—CMC, Divination and Arithmancy. Was nothing sacred?

As her hands gripped the cool metal of the doorknob, a realization dawned on her. She and James took the same new-since-third-year subjects because they had decided that when they had been friends—all the marauders had the same extra subjects except for Arithmancy, since Sirius took Ancient Runes instead of that one. 

She shook her head, willing the memories of when she and James had a _functioning _relationship to erase themselves from her mind. All she wanted to do was avoid everyone, lie down on her bed and veg. Too bad she didn't stop by the kitchens to grab a cookie or two so that she'd really feel better. Then again, she'd probably run into Sirius or Rhiannon, which would only remind her of her problems, because Sirius was James' best bud, and Rhiannon was Damaris' closest friend. Yet another reason for escaping her social duties. 

Lily stepped into the room, grateful that it was empty. Everyone was probably in the common room catching up on homework. She'd done all assignments already in hopes of distracting herself from thinking about James but now that she had nothing to do, it only caused her to think of nothing _but _him. 

Sighing, she dumped her school things on top of her trunk and flopped onto her bed, reminding herself again that James wasn't worth the trouble, that she should have known from the start that he'd never change. _Who does he think he is anyway? Thinks he can drop a relationship for no apparent reason and automatically assume that he's not going to hurt the girl—any girl—who's fallen in love with him? _she thought angrily, punching her pillow. But even as she tried to convince herself, she knew that James had really changed. He'd done it for her. So why was he acting like this now? 

The tears started to spill almost simultaneously, and she didn't hold them back. She couldn't help it, couldn't help thinking of how wrong all this was, couldn't help remembering the good times she'd had—the good times that James and she had _planned—back when things were okay. Now it was gone. Everything she had from the past year was gone… _

She let out another sob and turned over on her side, willing the pain to go away. Willing her brain to miraculously shut down. Finally, about what seemed like hours later, she felt her eyelids growing heavy and she started to let sleep take her…

"Lily? Are you okay?" 

Lily's eyes flew open, and she instinctively wiped her tears with a corner of her blanket. She knew that voice well, and she had no energy to deal with its owner tonight. 

"It's none of your business," she snapped rudely, facing Chase and giving her the most hateful glare that her energy could muster. Chase's arms were loaded with sweets and cookies and such, reminding Lily too vividly of her earlier craving. 

Chase's bright blue eyes hardened at Lily's reaction. "Well, excuse me for caring," she said, the familiar note of sarcasm evident in her voice. "You should have told me that you scheduled your daily cry-over-James fest for nine in the evening so that I'd leave you alone." 

Lily felt her heart tug again at Chase's comment, and before she could blink them back, two tears spilled down her cheeks. "Shut—shut up," she sniffled, failing to hold up the dam of crystalline drops now that they started flowing, all attempts at showing her resentment gone from her tone. She turned her back on Chase, expecting her to make a snide remark now that she had broken Lily's armor.

She heard Chase's footsteps coming closer and closer until they stopped, and she could feel her presence right beside her bed. _Here it comes…_

Instead of the verbal assault she'd predicted, she felt Chase gripping her shoulder and pushing it down so that she was facing her. "Get up. You're making yourself look pathetic," Chase ordered, tossing a cookie at her.

Lily caught it, puzzled at Chase's odd behavior. At least it had done one thing, the tears had stopped. She shakily sat up, gaining confidence and strength as she did so. "Who gave you the right to say that? Just because you're emotionally stable doesn't mean you can go around insulting those who aren't," she retorted irately. 

Chase rolled her eyes. "What would you rather have me do? Join in on your bawling on how unfair the male race is, act like a sympathizer who'll only make you feel worse for being pitied, or tell you to face the fact that you're degrading yourself? Our friendship might be over for you, but it won't take away the fact that I've known you inside out for four years. And I know that if you realized what you're doing right now, wallowing over a guy instead of fighting to get over it and making yourself stronger, you'd be disgusted with yourself." 

It was Lily's turn to roll her eyes. There she went again, preaching to Lily about what she should and shouldn't be doing. Couldn't Chase take a hint? She just couldn't keep her mouth shut, not even if the two of them were fighting. Lily opened her mouth, about to direct a scathing comeback to her former best friend, when something inside her clicked. _If you realized what you're doing right now, you'd be disgusted with yourself. _

The problem with Chase was, she was so irritating when she sounded like she knew everything that was going on and suggested the exact remedy for it. She was so confident and self-assured that it grated on Lily's nerves. 

But the truth was—and that infuriated Lily more—she knew that Chase was right.

"So, are you just going to keep on staring into space or what?" Chase said, snapping her out of her thoughts.

Lily glared at her halfheartedly. Suddenly she felt that arguing with Chase was useless. "At least it beats crying," she shot back.

"Is that an indirect way of admitting that you realized I was right?" Chase asked her.

Narrowing her eyes, Lily stared back at Chase. Was she mocking her to her face? Chase's eyes were twinkling, and Lily knew—and was sure of it—that her cynical witticisms were back. The genuine Chase was back. She felt like a weight was lifted from her shoulders—not all of it, that was for sure, but enough for her to feel a little better. In a sudden act of impulse she hugged her friend, causing her to drop the pastries she was holding onto Lily's bed.

Chase hugged her back, and Lily felt some of the tension being squeezed out of her. She never knew that not having Chase on her side would give her this much discomfort. Chase pulled away, a puzzled but relieved expression on her face. "I don't understand. Are we friends again?" 

Lily just nodded. Now that she had Chase on her side again, there was only one more thing to worry about. And she was determined to get past it.

*****  

"Why do I have to do this?" Rhiannon moaned as she chased after a pot that had two furry ears poking from the sides of the rim and four legs attached to the base. She and Damaris were inside an empty classroom, practicing the spell they were supposed to learn for their previous lesson in Transfiguration. 

Actually she knew exactly why she was doing this. Professor McGonagall had assigned James to tutor Damaris but since Lily and him broke up Damaris didn't dare approach him. The only person she could turn to was her best friend. Rhiannon didn't really mind much though. She knew Damaris felt bad about what happened and would have apologized to Lily long ago if she hadn't found out that Lily was practically an expert at hexes. If there was one thing that she feared the most, it was being cursed with the possibility that the spell that had a negative effect on her would be irreversible. 

Rhiannon sighed. She liked Transfiguration and all, but it was no picnic most of the time, unless you were James Potter. She collapsed onto one of the many empty desks in the classroom, giving up chase on her quarry. 

"I may be wrong, but I think you did a Cat Jinx on it, not the actual spell we're supposed to do," Damaris spoke up quietly, referring to her _Intermediate Transfiguration _book. "It says here the two are almost the same, there's just a subtle difference in the wand movement…"

Rhiannon responded with a groan and raised her wand once again. _"Finite," _she said sharply, and the runaway pot she had burned energy for just a few minutes ago returned to its normal, inanimate state. 

"Sorry for dragging you into this," Damaris said, picking up the pot rather lethargically. She had been that way ever since "the incident," as Rhiannon preferred to call it. 

Rhiannon smiled faintly, thinking of how her best friend's cheerfulness had declined for the past few days. "C'mon, I've read that a little more enthusiasm would do wonders if you're trying to get a spell right. Why don't you try it a bit while I take a breather?" Without waiting for an answer, she closed her eyes, focusing on breathing deeply and exhaling. 

Damaris nodded even though she knew Rhiannon couldn't see it. She felt that she should get this right today; Rhiannon certainly deserved to see her improving after all the effort the food fanatic had exerted in helping her. Focusing on the pot and her wand movement, she muttered the incantation under her breath and watched, half-amazed, as the lifeless pot transformed into a kitten before her eyes. She knelt down, gesturing for the tiny cat to come to her, and it happily obliged. She scratched it behind the ears and it purred softly in contentment.

Rhiannon's eyes flew open at the soft meowing. "Hey! You did it!" she exclaimed happily, jumping up from her chair and hugging her still-kneeling friend and knocking them both over in the process. The kitten, frightened by the sudden movement, darted out of the way and continued out the open door. 

The two friends scrambled to a sitting position on the floor. "Oh well," Rhiannon said with a shrug, "You can always get another pot to transform into a pet if you need it."

They both laughed, and Rhiannon realized that it was the first time in a while that Damaris was happy. Feeling like they had already practiced for a sufficient amount of time, she thought that maybe it was time for her to speak up on the Lily-James subject.

"Hey Damaris, have you, you know, talked to Lily yet?" she asked quickly, fidgeting with her wand and causing it to emit blue sparks. 

Damaris' eyes lost some of their glow. "Oh. Well, actually…not yet," she admitted, averting her gaze from her best friend. 

"Why not?" Rhiannon pressed. "I mean, I'm sure she wouldn't mind, if you tell her your side of the story…"

Damaris shook her head. "No, it's not that. It's just… she's been so upset and I don't want to make things worse. I'm sure she'll just hurl a curse at me once I'm within talking distance." 

Rhiannon grinned. "Aw, come on, Lily's not that bad. I'm sure she only jinxes people who deserve it."

"Yeah, and I _do deserve it," Damaris muttered dejectedly. _

"No you don't, if you tell her the whole story. If you ask for my opinion, you should try talking to her now while she's in a good mood." 

"A good mood?" 

Rhiannon nodded. "Yep. She and Chase made up already, didn't you know?" 

"And I was the one who caused their fight in the first place," Damaris interjected. 

Rhiannon gave herself a mental clap on the forehead. "Yeah…well…maybe _indirectly, but—"_

"It _was my fault, and you know it," Damaris insisted disconsolately. _

Rhiannon tried a different tack. "Fine, so, let's say it was your fault, but don't you blame yourself entirely, you didn't know Lily and James were going out. If you're taking blame, then it's only right that you should apologize, right? And I'm sure Lily would accept that. And it's better to do it when she's feeling happy at the moment than when she's in a bad mood."

This time her words seemed to be taking some effect. "I… I suppose that might work," Damaris said slowly. 

"It _will work. Best to do it while the thought's still fresh on your mind or you'll chicken out. Wait right here while I go fetch Lily, okay?" Rhiannon sprinted out of the room without waiting for an answer._

Damaris stopped at the doorway. "Wait! I'm still not sure if…" But too late, Rhiannon was gone.

*****  

Sirius and James met in one of the dungeon corridors. James had been assigned by Witzgromeneirre to rid the Potions classroom of any unpleasant ingredient remains, like frog guts and essence of skunk, because she had found out about his ordering Avery to do everything and had deducted ten points from Gryffindor to boot. James, who was feeling listless as usual and had no energy for any task which required concentration, had ordered Sirius to do it for him. Sirius grudgingly obeyed, remembering their bet, and reasoned that an order of manual labor from his best friend was better than a more embarrassing command when James was actually capable of thinking of a way to make him suffer, say for instance, making him dress like a house elf and answering his every beck and call for twenty-four hours. 

And that was the reason why Sirius had an unpleasant odor lingering about him as he and James walked down the dimly-lit hall. He was hoping that he could have spotted Chase and Snape doing their project somewhere down here, but each room they passed was empty. 

James sighed for the umpteenth time that night, which annoyed Sirius to no end. Not only was he forced to clean a whole room without magic (for that was how Witzgromeneirre liked her classroom cleaned, the horrible old goat), he had to put up with his best friend sulking. "For goodness' sake, Prongs, if you miss her that much then you should just go make up with her," he said exasperatedly. He took out a bottle of men's body spray from his robe pocket and started spraying himself furiously, to no avail. The skunk scent couldn't be gotten rid of no matter what he did. 

James shrugged, but didn't comment. 

Sirius, getting more irritated at James's lack of conversational skills at this moment, ranted on. "See, that's the problem. Some girl waltzes into your life and kisses you, and then you break up with your real girlfriend, which makes you roughly equivalent to the living dead—"

"Interesting, Black. Are you talking about yourself?" a sneering voice suddenly spoke up from the darkness behind them. 

Sirius wheeled around and surveyed his mocker coolly. "And what makes you say that, _Snivellus?" _

Snape's eyes glinted maliciously. "You know what I'm talking about, Black. Have you forgotten about Chase Tarlise, or should I relay her the message that what you two had was just a little fling?" 

"'What we had' is none of your damn business, greaseball, so keep your overlarge nose out of it," Sirius snapped, suddenly realizing the resemblance between James's plight and his own. 

"Getting a bit too defensive, aren't we? From your tone of voice I'd say you're still hung up on her," Snape said mockingly. 

"Yeah, well, whatever you have to say is never relevant, so excuse me if I—or anybody else, for that matter—have difficulty in believing you," Sirius retorted. His hand gripped his wand tightly in his pocket, but he fought the urge to hex the moron in front of him with all the self-restraint he could muster. 

"Anyone would hardly think whatever _you _say could possibly be said in all seriousness, Black, despite the word's uncanny resemblance to your name. But that's not the matter at hand, is it not? This is you and Chase we're talking about here—"

"Stop saying her name like you're a close friend of hers!" Sirius shouted at him. At that moment he wanted to vent all his frustrations from the second half of the last school year to the present onto Snape. How dare that slimeball stand there all smug and sly as if he and Chase were best buds and Sirius couldn't beat him for her attention? Why was it that Chase spent a suspiciously large amount of time with the school idiot but couldn't spare a single moment to smile at _him? _

"How would you know if I'm not a close friend of hers, Black? Are you supposed to monitor who she should or shouldn't hang around with? Should I pass that message along too? Though, I doubt very much that she'd like you meddling with her social life…"

Sirius laughed mirthlessly. "Spending a couple of hours with her with a cauldron and a fire doesn't amount to a plausible friendship, Snivellus."

"Why don't you ask her yourself? Ask her who she'd rather spend her time with, a Slytherin who could offer her reasonable advice and company, or a former Gryffindor boyfriend who broke her heart by going out with another girl in public—"

"THAT WASN'T MY FAULT!" Sirius yelled angrily at him. _One more quip, Snivellus, _he silently warned, _one more and I swear I'll hex you so bad you'll have to be lay down on a stretcher and sent to the intensive care unit of St. Mungo's…_

"Tut, tut, Black, you _should try learning to keep that fiery temper of yours in check; people might start to think that you're a raving lunatic, just because of your nonexistent—"_

But whatever nonexistent thing Sirius possessed, he never found out, because right at that moment he chose the time to aim a well-placed curse at Snape. Snape, caught off guard, got hit on the ear, and it transformed into what looked horribly like an elephant's ear. 

In revolted retaliation, Snape whipped out his own wand and muttered a string of incantations directed at Sirius. 

_"Protego!" _Sirius said at once, and while he was preoccupied deflecting most of the curses Snape took the time to perform the countercurse on his mutated ear. He was halfway done when Sirius once again attacked, sporting a right hand whose fingers were converted to five wriggling tentacles. He had failed to deflect the last curse.

_"Furnunculus! Impedimenta! Petrificus Totalus!" _The first two missed their mark entirely because Sirius had to use his left hand to hold his wand, but the Petrifying Curse hit Snape full in the chest, instantly making him stiff as a board. He crashed unceremoniously on the floor and Sirius advanced toward him, a menacing look in his eyes…

"STOP! Sirius Black, what the _bloody _hell do you think you're doing?!" 

At first Sirius didn't recognize the voice, but as the figure got closer he realized it was Chase, and she had a livid look on her face that he had never seen before. The rage alone in her tone must have made it unrecognizable. 

"Getting rid of the filth in the dungeons," he said without missing a beat, wondering why she looked so furious when she had let him curse Snape and his buddies more than a dozen times. 

SMACK! Sirius backed up a few steps, stunned, holding his left hand over his cheek. He didn't know what was wrong with Chase; if his memory wasn't malfunctioning he was positive she had just slapped him with all the angry adrenaline she had at her dispense. _What the hell—_

"What did he do to you?! And you," she turned to James, who looked like he had spaced out all throughout Sirius and Snape's fight, "what are you standing there for, when you could break them apart—"

"Hold on a sec," Sirius interrupted, getting over his momentary shock. "What's going on here—?"

"I'm the one who's supposed to ask that," Chase said, the rage gone from her tone and expression but replaced with overflowing disdain. "If you want a test dummy for your hexing practices go find a replacement, you've tortured Severus enough for four years…"

_What… test dummy…hexing practice…_Severus_…torture…what is she talking about?! _"I have _not _been hexing him without a reason, besides, he started it, and—what's it to you if I'm hexing Snape anyway?! Don't tell me you care about—" He stopped midsentence, staring in disbelief at Chase who was reversing the curses Sirius had inflicted on Snape and utterly bewildered at her dysfunctional behavior. 

"I still can't turn your ear back to normal… Severus, why don't you go to the infirmary and I'll take care of these two idiots myself?"

"No, I'm not through with Black yet—"

_"Now."_

Snape grudgingly stood up and glared at Sirius, his eyes glittering malevolently. The smug expression he still had on his face implied that he thought he had won, because Chase was siding with him, a Slytherin, and not with Sirius, one of Chase's longtime friends. With his half-shrunk elephant ear, he would have looked comical, but these were not normal circumstances; this was a time where Sirius was positive he had stepped into an alternate world—James didn't jump at the chance to join Sirius in his curse-Snivellus-to-oblivion opportunity; Chase was defending Snape and was livid with Sirius. 

When Snape had disappeared round the corner, Sirius turned his attention to Chase. "What the hell is up with you, Chase? You were hanging over that Slytherin scumbag like he was your precious pet—"

"Why did you have to hex him if he provoked you? If James was in the right state of mind he would have jumped right in and joined you—is that what you want? To curse him until he's permanently maimed?" Her voice was no longer angry or disgusted, but she spoke with such coldness that Sirius actually shivered. Chase never, ever talked like that unless she was speaking with somebody she hated. 

"Of course not, but—"

"But what?" 

Sirius looked helplessly at James. James sighed yet again but this time he spoke. "Snape was provoking Sirius, Chase. It's always been routine for them to hex each other after an exchange of insults." 

"What were you two fighting about, anyway?" Chase demanded, her blue eyes not reflecting any of their sparkle as she looked at Sirius. 

Sirius hesitated. "Well, he was, well, making up all these lies and—"

"Snape was telling Sirius some rubbish that he became a close friend of yours and that Sirius was acting like he had to approve who your friends had to be first," James said wearily. 

Sirius glared at him. Of all the times James had to speak at last, he had to say all the wrong words. 

"What! And who told you that you had the authority to decide who I'm supposed to be friends with?" Chase's eyes flashed as she shifted her gaze from James to Sirius.  

"I never said that, Prongs has it all wrong—"****

"Gods, Sirius, just because you hate Snape doesn't mean everybody else does," Chase said, as if Sirius were the most childish person on the planet.

"What're you talking about—don't tell me you actually think Snape is friend-worthy—"

"That's what I'm saying, and you just can't get it through your fat head that some people are worth knowing; you think you're above everybody else—"

"I do _not think that way, Snape is—and always will be—a class A git, and therefore not worthy of—"_

Chase shook her head and held up a hand. "Say whatever you have to say, Sirius, but don't expect me to hang around and listen to you. I'm outta here." 

Sirius opened his mouth to utter a last word of protest, but none came. He alternately opened and closed his mouth, staring after Chase's retreating form. 

He looked at James in complete bewilderment, his expression effectively conveying, _What the hell was that all about?  But like usual, James only shrugged, not looking the least bit shocked at Chase's atypical outburst. _

Sirius looked back at the empty corridor before him. He had a feeling that he couldn't be able to formulate a complete sentence what with everybody interrupting whatever he was going to say. Why was Chase suddenly being so unreasonable? Was she going crazy?

Or was he?

*****  

**A/N – **OotP might be out but I'm sticking to the personalities I've thought up for them instead of the canon ones. I'll end this story after two more chapters, I think. Feedback is more than welcome. 


	8. Emotional Pandemonium

**Complications**

**By Dimantrien**

**Chapter 8: Emotional Pandemonium **

8: 30 pm. There were thirty minutes left till the students' curfew, but Lily didn't feel like whiling away the remaining half hour outside the Gryffindor Tower. For one, she didn't have company, and for another, she didn't want to run into…some people. Nevertheless, she was fine just staying where she was, and that was lying sprawled on her bed, thinking about nothing. Or at least, _trying to think about nothing, which seemed to be so hard to do at the moment. _

Just then the door banged open. Lily lifted her head slightly to glimpse the new arrival: Chase. She sat up, looking at her generally calm friend appearing uncommonly fuming.

"Hey. Bad night?" Lily asked uncertainly as Chase stalked up to her own bed. She had just gotten back to being friends with Chase again, and she didn't want to lose that after less than twenty-four hours. 

Chase covered her face with her hands and fell back first onto her bed. "Not at all." 

Lily stood up and inspected the impression in the wall made by the doorknob that appeared after Chase flung the door open—hard. She recalled hearing Celeste doing the same thing with the marauders' dorm room's door only days ago. She heard it because she could hear the resounding bang so loudly—and she was in the girls' dormitory then. She wondered what was up with the twins and their wall-denting tendencies. "Yeah, I can see that by the way you so carefully made your entrance." 

Chase groaned. "Fine, so I'm not feeling so dandy tonight. Let's leave it at that."

Under ordinary conditions, Lily knew she shouldn't be pushing it, but Chase showing her anger openly was definitely not normal. "Well… since being furious is so unlike you, I don't think I can 'leave it at that' without having a sleepless night wondering what the hell got you so riled up," she pointed out. 

Chase turned to look at her and scowled. "Knowing you, that translates as nagging me until I tell you what's bothering me, which will leave _both of us sleepless," she countered._

Lily laughed. "Since you know me so well, shouldn't you just resign to the inevitable and spill instead of formulating your usual one-liner quips?" 

 Chase sighed in resignation. "All right already. See, I skipped dinner because I had to meet up with Severus for our Potions project—"

"Wait, don't tell me, he was being a git as usual and that caused you to get mad on top of having an empty stomach," Lily guessed.

Chase shook her head. "Severus hasn't given me a hard time since we started meeting up in our free time," she said matter-of-factly. "If you must really know, it was Sirius who was acting like a git."

"Sirius?" Lily repeated in a puzzled voice. "But what did he do to you?" 

"Well, after we made up, I suddenly remembered that I left my bottle of powdered unicorn horn in the dungeons, and when I went back there to get it, I saw Sirius hexing Severus and James just standing there, staring off into space."

Lily felt her stomach churn at the mention of James but ignored it. "So? That isn't anything out of the ordinary, is it?" she said instead, chuckling weakly. Damn James Potter and the effect his mere _name _had on her!

Chase's eyes flashed, making Lily suddenly regret what she said. But…why should she? The marauders jinxing Snape was not exactly front-page news. 

"I guess I didn't say it more clearly; I meant Sirius was looking murderous and attempted hexing Severus who was completely helpless with the Full Body Bind on him, and the idiot's excuse of acting the way he did was because he's stupid enough to think that he should decide who my friends ought to be, like I was a dolt who couldn't distinguish a decent friend from an incompetent slob by myself," Chase said, the underlying tone of spite in her voice giving away the fact that she wasn't as indifferent as she usually was.

Now Lily was even more confused. "But what does that have to do with him cursing Snape?" _And since when did you start referring to that grease head by his first name? she added silently, though her instincts told her not to say it aloud. _

Chase rolled her eyes. "He seems to have a problem with me being friends with Severus—"

"WHAT!" Lily shouted, her mind reeling. Suddenly she understood everything. "Don't tell me you're—_friends—with that…that…"_

"You're just as bad as Sirius is," Chase complained, her expression going from anger at Sirius to irritation at the redhead.

"Fine, so…so, you're friends with Snape," Lily said hurriedly, not wanting to annoy her friend. She felt weird saying the words; _Snape _and _friend just didn't go together. "Well, don't expect me not to be shocked since it was less than three months ago when you yourself were hexing him on the school train just for the fun of it!" she suddenly said exasperatedly, not finding anything else to say._

"I bet that was exactly what Sirius thought too," Chase muttered under her breath. "Well, the point is, he's my friend now, and as much as I didn't like him before that doesn't give Sirius the right to step in and tell me our friendship is off-limits."

Lily just gaped at her, at a loss for words for a moment. The phrase _Chase and _Snape _are friends _was still registering itself in her brain. Then a thought occurred to her. "Wait a minute, don't tell me you _fancy Snape…"_

Chase laughed. "Oh, it's nothing like that. I just realized that he's a pretty decent person, once you look at him a couple of times when he's hex-free and in a good mood." 

"Considering his House…" _A decent Slytherin is like a Hagrid who despises life-threatening, fanged beasts, Lily thought. _

"Right. But I think I've got him pretty much convinced not to keep on with that Mudblood rubbish…"

Lily barely heard her. _Padfoot is furious with their being friends, well, that's understandable because he's always so protective of her. And I guess Snape can be an OK guy sometimes…wait, what am I saying? A normal person would definitely not think that…Then again, Chase isn't exactly a normal girl…_

"…so arrogant, I can't believe he could think that he can control my decisions…" 

_But why should Chase be mad at Sirius? She's never cared what Sirius thinks, what anybody thinks, for that matter… She hasn't been acting like herself for the past few days, first having a fight with me and now ranting about Sirius…ever since Sirius and Rhiannon—_"Wait a minute!!!" These three words she said aloud, cutting off Chase's tirade. 

"What are you saying?" Chase said blankly as the door opened, admitting Rhiannon. 

The two friends glanced at the doorway at the breathless blonde. Chase stiffened and stopped talking; Lily smiled and waved hello. 

Rhiannon didn't seem to notice Chase's lackluster attitude and turned to Lily. "Lily! You've gotta come quick! We've only got fifteen minutes till curfew…" She strode over to Lily's bed and tugged at her arm, pulling her from the bed and dragging her to the doorway. 

"Hey, hey, wait just a second! What are you doing and where are we going—?" Lily started to demand.

Rhiannon didn't give her a straight answer. "It's really important, c'mon! Oh yeah, Chase, you don't mind me borrowing her for a few minutes, right?" 

"Sure," Chase said in a tone that Lily recognized as forced cheerfulness. 

Lily didn't protest as she was half-dragged to the portrait hole by the energetic girl. 

She could tell Chase about her sudden realization later. 

*****  

Damaris waited restlessly for Rhiannon to come back, half-hoping that she didn't have the emerald-eyed redhead with her. She knew that she had to get her apology over with, but for the past fifteen minutes she'd been here alone, she couldn't properly form an appropriate way of saying sorry what with her panic and uncertainty that Lily would be willing to talk to her.

_Let's see… I'm really sorry, I had no idea you and James were a couple, I just didn't know what I was thinking at that time… No, that won't work… I'm really, really, _really _sorry… no, too many "really's" will make it sound insincere… How about—_

"I'm back!" Rhiannon's singsong voice interrupted the stillness, doubling Damaris' panic as she heard two sets of footsteps approaching the classroom. 

Her best friend stepped into the room, followed by Lily Evans, who instantly tensed the moment she registered what this was all about. Lily glared at her before whirling around to face Rhiannon, probably to go off on her for bringing her here.

Rhiannon held up a hand. "Wait. Before you blow up at me, Damaris wants to say something." She stared pointedly at the nervous brunette who was fidgeting with her wand and averting her eyes from Lily.

As soon as Damaris risked a glance at the fiery redhead, she instantly lost all shreds of courage left. Lily's mouth was a thin line that reminded Damaris a bit of how McGonagall looked when she was angry, and her right hand was inside her robe pocket, as if she was ready to curse Damaris at the slightest provocation. 

Damaris took a deep breath. "I…I j-just want to say…"

"Well, get to the point, I don't have all night," Lily snapped spitefully, her glower not fading in the slightest. She started tapping her foot in a staccato pace, making Damaris feel as if Lily were counting down the seconds till her death sentence.

"I-I'm really sorry," Damaris said finally, looking at Lily directly now and willing herself not to flinch under the other girl's death glare. "I never meant to—"

Lily stopped tapping her foot and crossed her arms. "Oh, I see. I've been dragged here to hear an _apology. But why is there a little voice in my head telling me that I should have heard this since, what, three days ago? Seems to me as if it's long overdue." _

Damaris nodded. She knew she deserved that glare, that quiet yet hate-filled voice. "I know," she said softly. "I should have done it earlier, but I was too scared. But please, please try to understand. I never—I never would have done it if I knew you two were a couple."

"So now you're saying it's my fault that you kissed James?" Lily demanded, her quiet tone cracking and her voice rising. "What, did you expect me to hand out fliers on the first day of school announcing that James Potter and I are a couple to the Zynergrand students?" 

"N-no! I'm not blaming you, I'm just trying to say that…that I hate being the reason that you two broke up, and—"

"Of course you'd hate it!" Lily shouted, cutting off her stuttering words. "Who'd want to take the blame? You wish you'd never gotten between us, but here you are. You'd want to do anything to rid yourself of the guilt, don't you? Well, let me tell you one thing. 'Sorry' never gets anybody anywhere! Do you think your apology can take back what James said to me, how much hurt I had to cope with because of that?! Do you think it's that easy to forget a big mistake that an ignorant girl like you _'accidentally' _caused?! If 'sorry' would suffice to make people with faults feel good about themselves, then they wouldn't have any guilt to make them as miserable as the ones they inflicted suffering upon! And it'd be ski season in hell before I allow that to happen!!!" Lily stopped to take a deep breath, her face flushed with rage. 

Damaris was near tears. Rhiannon started to step toward them with a worried expression on her face, but Damaris shook her head. This was all her fault. She wouldn't let Rhiannon get caught in the crossfire. "I deserved what you said," she said slowly, fighting to swallow the lump that was building in her throat. "And more. I know that sorry will never be enough. If you wanted to, I'd do anything…anything to get you and James back together. I just want you to forgive me."

"I don't need your help to get him back. I don't even know if I _want _him back, thanks to you," Lily said coldly. "But maybe I had it all wrong. Maybe you two deserve each other. After all, you've got one thing in common, the ability to make somebody feel so hurt without any effort at all. Why don't you get together with him, and discover a lot of other niceties about each other? I'm sure you two share some more horrid qualities, more than what I can clearly see already, anyway." Lily turned on her heel and walked past Rhiannon, her eyes glistening with what were unmistakably angry tears. 

Rhiannon grabbed her wrist just as she had a clear field on the door. "Wait, Lily, I'm begging you on this. Please…give her one last chance to apologize—"

"I have to go," Lily said indifferently, trying to tug her wrist free. "I'm wasting my time and breath just standing here. Let me go." 

"Lily!" Damaris called her, her lower lip trembling. "Even if you don't want to get back together with James, I'll never touch him. You two are supposed to be together. But if you really don't want him back, at least let me do something for you that could compensate for my mistake. It's not just about me wanting to rid myself of guilt. I don't want to see others looking so upset…and know that I was the cause of their sadness." 

For a moment, it looked like Lily's eyes softened, but it was gone as quickly as it had come. "How touching," she said coolly. "Unfortunately, that speech is quite hard to believe as I don't think that there can be many people left in this world who could be so…noble." Lily gave her a disdainful look. Taking advantage of Rhiannon's temporary distraction at hearing Damaris' words, she slipped her wrist out of the blonde girl's grip and took a step toward the door.

"If you still loved James, would you have given her a chance?" Rhiannon spoke quietly. 

Lily stopped in her tracks, hesitating for a brief moment. But it was enough for Rhiannon. 

"I might have thought about it," was her response. And then she strode out, her footsteps fading as she walked farther and farther away.

Damaris collapsed into a chair, putting her hands over her face and almost as instantly removing them, staring at the tear-stained palms. "That certainly didn't go over too well," she said miserably, the perfect picture of hopelessness.

"I wouldn't say that just yet," Rhiannon replied, her eyes glinting with fresh determination. _It doesn't take a skilled Legilimens to know that Lily was lying about not wanting James back, she thought.__ "Maybe there __is something we can still do."_

*****  

A three-foot high stack of notes was placed neatly on top of a study table in the common room, and Remus' head was visible just behind it as he scanned them parchment by parchment and highlighted topic headings and important terms with the tip of his wand. Just as he was skimming over Cheering Charms (he was organizing his third year Charms notes), Sirius stumbled inside the entrance, looking half-bewildered, half-upset. Wondering what happened to his friend this time, he restacked his notes and bound them together with a thin rope with a wave of his wand and strolled over to Sirius, who had thrown himself into a cushiony armchair by the fire while a few Gryffindors glanced curiously at him. 

"Everything all right, Padfoot?" Remus asked, settling into the armchair opposite Sirius'. 

Sirius was looking blankly at him, and then, as if he had just realized that Remus was there, he stirred. "Oh, hiya Moony. Pleasant night, isn't it?" he said vaguely. 

Remus rolled his eyes. "Yes, yes, I believe it is. But I was thinking that your answer ought more to have been about why you're acting like a zombie since you went into the common room." 

"Right… Hey, Moony, do you think I'm crazy?" Sirius suddenly asked in a serious tone.

It was Remus' turn to put on a blank expression. He figured this was probably some kind of joke that Sirius had formulated, though he couldn't get why he wasn't grinning. "Ever since you hexed Snape with the Disorientation Spell while he was taking his second year practical Potions exam right under Ridgewood's nose." 

"That's… I mean, good, I knew you thought that way…" Sirius trailed off, his voice still sounding a bit like he didn't know what exactly he was saying. 

Remus raised his eyebrows and stared suspiciously at Sirius, as if _he _was the one who had been subjected to a Disorientation Spell. "Are you sure you're okay?" he asked again.

"Yeah, yeah, totally fine…" 

"Oh yeah? Where've you been?" 

For the first time, something like recognition dawned in Sirius' eyes. "Have you seen Chase?"

"Are you going to give me a straight answer tonight at all or should I have to find a way to nick some Veritaserum to force you to make sense?" Remus said irritably. 

"But I _am making sense," said Sirius in a perplexed voice. _

"And I suppose answering my question with a question that is unrelated to what we're talking about is proof that your sanity is not slipping in the slightest," Remus retorted sardonically. 

Sirius appeared to be regaining some of his vigor. "If you must know, me and James were walking round the dungeons when we chanced upon Snape and had a nice little chat with him—"

"James joined you in exchanging hexes with Snape?" Remus interrupted with raised eyebrows.

"No, he was just standing there," Sirius said impatiently, finally looking like he was trying to prove a point. "And—you'll never believe what happened next—Chase came storming towards us and shouted that I shouldn't be attacking her _friend—"_

"Hold on a moment," Remus interjected yet again (Sirius made an annoyed noise), "Are you saying that _Chase defended __Snape and shouted at _you _because you were cursing him?" _

_"Yes," _Sirius answered, looking highly disgruntled now. 

Remus burst out laughing. "Good one, Padfoot! Didn't expect you'd spring a joke that way, with you acting like a weirdo and all—" His chuckling faltered when he saw Sirius' amusement-free expression. 

"I'm serious, Moony," he said stonily, more annoyed than ever. 

"I know who you are," Remus said carefully, referring to the age-old serious-Sirius pun, trying to determine whether his friend was pulling his leg again or not. Sirius' face was unusually grave, a sharp difference from the easygoing facial expressions he usually conveyed… "I mean, you're kidding, you've gotta be senile to think that a Gryffindor and a Slytherin could be friends…"

"Yeah, well, that's why I asked you if I was going mad," Sirius said grudgingly, apparently aggravated that Remus wasn't taking his word for it. 

"Wait a minute..." Comprehension dawned in Remus' eyes. "That's why they were getting along so well in Potions! Remember, you pointed it out to me the other day?" 

"I knew there was something fishy about what she wrote when we were passing notes to each other during Ancient Runes," Sirius said, frowning. 

"Well, she must see something in him that we don't, like a possibility of a hidden congenial personality…" Remus trailed off.

"Congenial? That overgrown greasy bat in teenager's clothing? That's like saying an egg can grow hair—"

Remus smiled faintly. "An egg can grow hair if you put a spell on it."

"—of its own free will!" Sirius barreled on, ignoring Remus' remark. "He must've done something to Chase, that git's up to his ears in the Dark Arts, you know! If he laid one greasy finger on her—"

"Chase knows about his love of the Dark Arts, she's not stupid enough to let down her guard around him. I think she really trusts Snape out of her own free will," Remus said matter-of-factly.

"Why are you suddenly reasoning about the friendship thing?! Just seconds ago you were just as indignant about it!" Sirius said angrily.

Remus shook his head. "I don't like it, of course, but it really is Chase's decision who her friends ought to be, Sirius. Maybe that's why she got mad at you, because you were hysterical that she was friends with Snape."

Sirius looked like he was going to say another furious retort, but his face softened a little. "Yeah, she did mention that," he admitted. "But it still doesn't make sense! What has she got to gain with being friends with Snivellus?" 

"Possibly a lot of things. Like having peace and order throughout the joint Potions project. Like not having any more pointless duels with him. Like setting him straight that on no account is he to have non-platonic feelings for her any longer—"

"Well, it looks to me as if that's exactly what he's doing!" Sirius said. "He's getting all friendly with her, so that she'll see him in a new light and then he'll try to make her fall in love with him… As if he can, though, with that ugly face of his…"

Remus stared intently at his friend. "Even though that were the case, mate, why should you care?" 

Sirius looked outraged. "Why should I _not _care? Chase can't go out with _Snivellus, _he's too—Why are you smirking?!" For Remus had broken into a grin.

"Sorry," Remus said hurriedly, "but that's exactly why Chase is annoyed with you, you're acting like she's this fragile butterfly that you need to protect…"

"What's wrong with that?" Sirius demanded.

"What's wrong is that you can't tell her what to do. Chase is independent, she can stand alone without you, Sirius. It's an insult to her—and probably any self-respecting witch, for that matter—that you think she can't go along with her life without your security."

"I didn't say she can't get on with anything by herself," Sirius said heatedly.

"But you were implying it," Remus said gently. "From the way you told me too, that's how you felt about the matter. And for another thing, Padfoot, you can't go around claiming you're her protector. She's not your girlfriend anymore, and might I remind you, you've got a new one, and I don't think Rhiannon would be happy to hear that you care more about Chase than her." 

Sirius cursed under his breath. "How do you know about all these things?" he asked finally. "It's not like you're a girl who can understand crazy things that other females do…"

Remus shrugged. "Celeste tells me a lot about Chase and how to guess what she's thinking; it's pretty hard to understand what she feels, you know, what with her being so impassive all the time." 

"Right…" Sirius said, looking a bit embarrassed that his friend knew more about his ex-girlfriend than he did. 

"Do you still love Chase?" Remus asked him in a low voice, as not to let anybody else in the common room overhear. 

Sirius' cheeks flushed. "I…I don't know," he muttered, averting his gaze. The portrait hole opened and Lily came in, and he took the opportunity to mumble a quick "I'm going to bed" and slip away to the boys' dormitory when Remus glanced over distractedly at their redhead friend. 

Remus stared at Sirius' retreating back, and saw that the back of his neck was red, like it always was when he was uncomfortably embarrassed. "I do believe you still do, Padfoot," he said quietly, "I do believe you still do." 

*****  

**A/N – **I'm sorry for being late, school is really hectic right now and I've become suspicious that my teachers are harboring a secretly vindictive pleasure in piling us with projects and requirements and practical tests and, of course, making us poor students thoroughly miserable. I'm starting to think I know exactly how Harry felt when all his teachers gave his class a tidal wave of homework over the weeks in his O.W.L. year… And on top of that, my computer broke down and was out of commission for a couple of weeks because of the worm virus thing… I nearly had a heart attack worrying that my files would be erased once my dad had the PC reformatted…plus, he forbade me to use the Internet a few days after that, I s'pose it's paranoia that the worm virus will strike back…

Peeved and problematic,

~Dimantrien


	9. Quotable Quotes

**Complications **

**By Dimantrien**

**Chapter 9: Quotable Quotes**

"But what _can we do?" Damaris asked, still looking unconvinced that there was any hope in repairing Lily and James's relationship. "Lily hates me, she's annoyed at you because of me, and she never wants to look at James again because of me—"_

"Stop rambling, I just had a brilliant plan in how we're going to bring them back together," Rhiannon admonished, her idea still running through her head.

"I don't think you should get your hopes up, Rhi, anything we do is useless. I can't exactly force her to forgive me, you know," Damaris said, looking extremely disheartened. She buried her face in her hands. "This is all my fault," she said in a muffled voice.

Rhiannon laid a hand on her friend's shoulder. "Keep in mind, Damaris, that the pen is mightier than the sword."

"And what does that have to do with the issue at hand?" Damaris asked, starting to look a little annoyed at Rhiannon's vagueness. 

"Well, if you're through with your hopeless woes, I'll tell you."

Damaris sighed. "I suppose this thing can't get any worse…"

And she leaned forward to listen to her friend's self-proclaimed marvelous plan to reunite Lily Evans and James Potter, feeling that she would do anything at this point to help the latter pair get back together if she wanted her spirits to rise anytime in the near future. 

***** 

Celeste entered their dormitory room after a day in the library. She was a little taken aback to find that the room had only two occupants at ten o'clock in the evening, and the said occupants were looking more than a little irate. "Uh…you two didn't have another fight, did you?" she asked cautiously as she stared at her best friend and her twin, who were both lying down in their respective beds and glaring at the ceiling of their four-poster. She was starting to feel relieved again that the two of them had made up and she didn't know what to do if they started yelling at each other again.

Chase turned to look at her. "No, we're both just contemplating about the attitudes of the idiots in our lives," she said humorlessly, glancing at Lily, whose face softened a little at Chase's remark.

"Would you care to translate that?" Celeste asked, dumping her books on top of her trunk. 

"Damaris tried to apologize to Lily," Chase replied.

Celeste brightened. "Well, that's great, isn't it? Everybody's laying down their pride now, first the two of you, now Damaris, so what's there to be mad about—?"

Lily made a snorting noise.

"I said 'tried,' my dear twin," Chase said calmly. "Lily didn't accept her apology."

"But—?" 

"Don't ask her why," Chase said quietly so that Lily wouldn't hear. "And frankly, I don't blame her for what she did. Sometimes, in cases when somebody snatches your boyfriend from your grasp, you won't be able to forgive them easily. And perhaps you won't be able to forgive the boyfriend—I mean, James, too." 

Celeste had a sneaking suspicion that Chase was not merely talking about Lily alone. "But Damaris didn't 'snatch' James from her like Maxine Eamon did to Sirius in your case!" she pointed out.

Chase's eyes darkened. "Leave me and Sirius out of this," she said, and it was in a slightly bitter tone that she said Sirius' name. 

Celeste raised her eyebrows, but didn't comment. "Sorry," she said, staring at her unusually peeved twin. Of course, she already had a highly probable theory concerning the reason of said twin's complete one-eighty in attitude. 

"Let's just go to sleep. It's getting late, you know," Chase stated, gesturing at the clock on her nightstand and rolling over in her bed so that her back was to Celeste.

_Yeah right, more like, "Let's go to sleep before the Zynergrand boyfriend poachers get back," _Celeste thought. Things were really messed up now: Sirius was with Rhiannon, but Celeste was pretty sure that Chase hadn't really gotten over him like she said she did; Damaris caused James and Lily to break up, but despite Lily's rants that she never wanted to get together with a jerk like James again, Celeste knew that she still loved him. She wished that this would all blow over soon. She was tired of seeing her best friend and her sister suffering under emotional stress, and she was annoyed with herself that she couldn't do anything about it. Even if she herself had problems, she still had Remus. Chase and Lily had no one.

It was times like this that she felt bad about having a steady boyfriend.

*****  

A week passed, and the tension between the group of friends was still thick. Remus, Celeste and Peter were the only ones who stayed neutral. Some kind of hope must have kindled inside James, because he was now trying to apologize to Lily every chance he got instead of avoiding her, but Lily was resolutely turning a blind eye and a deaf ear whenever he was around. Chase stopped talking to Sirius and was always conspicuously absent during their free time, and Sirius had been, like James, sapped of all troublemaking energy and was usually seen sulking and grumpy. 

He was no less moody when Rhiannon came bouncing up to him after their Wednesday classes.

"Hey, Black, you got a sec?" she asked cheerfully, her blue eyes twinkling. 

Sirius sighed. He knew he had, in some crazed state, snogged her before, but he didn't have it in him to try to develop a new relationship anymore. Not when Chase was angry at him, and not when she had favored _Snape's _company_ over his…_

"—was wondering if you'd like to help, 'cause they're your best friends and all…Sirius! Are you even listening?" 

Rhiannon had stopped in the middle of the semi-crowded corridor, waving her hands irritably in front of Sirius' face. 

He stared at her. Just looking at her bright and _happy _mood made him lose heart in telling her that he wasn't interested in her anymore… Besides, he didn't know how good she was at jinxing yet; it wasn't wise to get on her bad side until he was completely sure of her hexing capabilities. "Sorry, I wasn't listening," he mumbled, trying to think of a plausible excuse to get away.

Rhiannon raised an eyebrow. "I can see that. But you can't be spacing out about this, it's way too important! It's about James and Lily—" 

"Look, can I talk to you later? I've got a load of homework to do, been holding it up since last week," Sirius interrupted hurriedly, and before Rhiannon could open her mouth, he scurried away and disappeared into the mob of after-school dinner goers. 

Rhiannon stared at the throng that had swallowed her maybe-boyfriend. She was pretty sure that he had purple shadows under his eyes and that he was a little pale, quite unlike how he looked when they were in the kitchen the other day… She turned slightly pink at the memory. He seemed happy and energetic then, but why was he suddenly gloomy and irritated when she approached him? _Something's wrong, something must be bothering him… _She suddenly felt uneasy, as if something bad was going to happen soon. 

She went on to the Great Hall, thinking about how Sirius said he had a lot of homework to do, but knowing that he had been lying. The only thing that Sirius could possibly put before food was planning a good prank, and he didn't have the manic glint in his eyes and the mischievous grin that was always planted on his face whenever he was in prankster mode. She felt a twinge of anxiety again.

And she walked on, a cloud of gloom and discomfort hovering above her, unaware that she had now caught the same emotional unease as James, Sirius, Chase and Lily. 

*****  

Remus and Celeste ran down numerous corridors, following a small blue orb that was speedily darting through intersections and concealed doors, up staircases and across passageways. 

"Are you _sure that thing's going to lead us to Chase?" Celeste said breathlessly as they chased after the circular object. _

"Positive. I put a Tracking Charm on her when she wasn't paying attention, and unless she recently put a Fidelius Charm on herself so that she can't be found, we're sure to find her soon."

"Where are we anyway?" Celeste panted, her eyes scanning the corridor they were dashing through. Torches with green flames hung on the walls, the only source of light (aside from the luminous blue orb before them) in the otherwise dark passage. The floor was slightly damp, and there were no windows or doors along the stone walls. It was like they were running through an endless tunnel. "This place is really creepy…"

"It's probably one of the lesser used dungeon corridors," Remus assured her before glancing down at the Marauder's Map, which he had nicked from James that morning. It wasn't exactly hard; James hardly paid any attention to anything other than Lily these days. It occurred to him that Chase wasn't anywhere on the map, then again, he assumed that she had put a spell on herself to prevent it from showing where she was. He figured she didn't want to take any chances if Sirius was trying to look for her.

Suddenly the levitating blue orb stopped short, causing Remus to stand still abruptly and Celeste to crash into him, ending the situation into two bodies crashing onto the hard, damp stone floor. 

Celeste and Remus both groaned as they picked themselves up, and there was a great deal of profanity-muttering about a stupid blue thing that didn't show the least trace of warning before halting in a place where the ground was not carpeted. This went on for a few moments until Celeste realized that the said orb was gone.

"Hey—where'd the idiot thing go?" she said loudly, surveying the dim surroundings. 

"Ah… I suppose it continued on to its pursuit of Chase while we were momentarily distracted," he said apologetically.

"What! After we ran all the way here to this stuffy place to look for my god-knows-where sister, it disappears?!" Celeste exclaimed, looking more than a little disgruntled that her efforts, which had also caused her face to go all red and blotchy, had been completely futile.

Remus brightened. "Wait, I remember—if it stopped, it means that it has already led us to Chase—" 

"Yes, and I sure see her right now, d'you think she's hiding under an Invisibility Cloak, smirking at our antics?" Celeste said sarcastically.

"Well, I suppose you're right." Remus winced at her annoyed tone.

Celeste's face softened. "Sorry. It's just that I'm starting to get worried; Chase hasn't been herself these past few days, and she's always with Snape and that makes me wonder what kind of Dark Art he's testing on her…"

Remus' eyes widened in realization. "That must be it! She's probably with Snape right now. After all, Slytherins seem to prefer the dark and gloomy and I just bet this is where he asked Chase to meet him."

"If she _was with Snape, then even if Chase was wiped off the map Snape wouldn't be, and he's nowhere around here either," Celeste pointed out, putting her index finger to where the two tiny dots labeled "Remus Lupin" and "Celeste Schoharie" were. _

"It's probable that she put the same charm she did on herself on him, as we already know that if she isn't with us, she's with Snape. See, Snape isn't anywhere on the map, either." The young werewolf held the map before her, and sure enough, there was no "Severus Snape" dot milling anywhere on the magical map. "Although, it says here that there's a secret passage right beside us. Want to try it out?" 

Celeste shrugged. "Do we have a choice?" She started tapping the right wall of the corridor, trying to see where the trigger to open the passage was. She poked her finger at a particularly crumbly-looking block of stone and for a second the block shuddered, and one by one the stones before them disappeared until they formed a doorway. 

Inside they indeed found Chase and Snape, standing on opposite sides of a cauldron bubbling with a bright blue potion and looking utterly surprised to see them. 

*****  

"I thought," said Snape coolly, "that we would be ensured privacy in making this potion if we worked _here_." This statement he addressed to Chase, who was still staring at her friend and her twin. 

"What are you two doing here?" Chase asked the two, ignoring Snape, who rolled his eyes and settled for glaring at the intruders.

"Looking for you," Celeste said in businesslike tones, striding forward and taking advantage of her sister's bewilderment by taking her by the arm and pulling her toward the door. "If you don't mind my saying, _Severus, _I daresay the company you've spent with my sister for almost three hours is quite sufficient already, so we must be going now." She glowered at Snape, who stared balefully back. 

"Well, if you don't mind my saying, Schoharie, it isn't your business to decide with who Chase decides to spend her time, and as she was just saying before you and Lupin rudely barged in uninvited, we would complete the potion after another hour. I suppose she's _allowed to finish schoolwork, isn't she?" Snape said spitefully._

Celeste could barely contain screaming at him. How could her twin _stand _the slime ball, let alone befriend him and say that he was decent? _Decent! A decent Snape, my ass, I might as well admit that Chase is off her rocker… _

Chase stirred beside her. "Yeah, sis, it's just for another hour, after that we can do whatever you want… I suppose you were really desperate to talk to me, seeing the lengths you went through to find me," she said, back to her usual sarcastic self. 

"Oh, well, I suppose it won't hurt," Celeste grumbled, superbly irritated with Snape, who gave her a triumphant smirk. "Remus and I will just sit here and wait for you, then," she added in a suddenly sweet tone, wiping the smile off Snape's face. She sat down on the floor Indian-style, smiling saccharinely at Snape. 

Remus, who hadn't been talking all this while, nodded. "Yeah, we can wait. I'm sure you don't mind, do you, Chase? Or you, Snape?" he added, smiling slightly at Snape, who looked more than a little irritable at Celeste's sudden proposition. 

Snape opened his mouth, most probably to object, but Chase was the one who answered first. "Suit yourself. I'm sure you two'll be awfully bored by the time we're finished, though," she replied, shrugging. She turned back to the cauldron and started poking at the purple flames beneath it.

"Oh, we won't be," Remus answered pleasantly, enjoying getting the rise out of Snape. He smirked as Snape stalked over to Chase and started muttering to her in low tones, glaring at Celeste and him once in a while. He sat down on the cool floor beside Celeste. "Good thinking," he whispered to her. In this way they could keep watch over Snape and anything suspicious he could possibly be planning. And with the added bonus of getting the opportunity to infuriate Snape without his retaliation (Snape's comebacks had to be limited to non-offensive ones, as he couldn't say anything bad about Chase's friends in front of her), he felt that the sixty minutes ahead would be anything but dull.

*****  

Yet another week passed by, and still Damaris and Rhiannon's plan, whatever it was, remained unknown and inactive. Damaris, who was determined to straighten up the mess she had caused, was once again to be found in the library, looking up the "pieces" that they needed for the plan. But currently she was having a particularly hard time looking for them, as she doubted that the magical library was likely to hold a book that contained the information she sought. She was starting to think that she should be looking for the information somewhere else, when Rhiannon appeared beside her, looking terrible: her eyes were bloodshot and her face tearstained; she was trembling as if she would collapse any minute.

"Rhi! What's wrong?" Damaris asked, startled, as she sat her friend down and wrapped an arm around her. 

"S-sirius dumped me," Rhiannon sniffed, a tear making its way down her cheek. 

"What?" Damaris said loudly, and Madame Pince shot her a glare. "Why? I thought you two were getting along," she whispered, glancing apprehensively at the furious librarian. She reached into her bag and handed Rhiannon a tissue.

"Well, I g-guess he didn't really _dump _me, I mean, he was really n-nice and p-polite in saying it…"

"You're saying he was _nice_ if he broke up with you?" Damaris said incredulously, giving the table a resounding slap that echoed through the almost deserted library in emphasis. Again, Madame Pince looked at her with daggers in her eyes, but Damaris ignored her.

"N-no, I meant, I meant he said he was really sorry, and that he didn't want to hurt me but he felt that he still—that he still—"

"That he still what?" Damaris prompted gently, handing Rhiannon another tissue.

"He said that he still liked Chase Tarlise," Rhiannon said quietly. 

"But—didn't they have that awful row a few weeks ago?" Damaris asked, confused. It didn't seem logical that Sirius would still like Chase after she had yelled at him like that.

"Oh, it wasn't a _row_," Rhiannon said bitterly, her voice losing its shaky quality, "Chase was the one who did all the shouting, and I still can't figure out what Sirius could see in her after that." 

"They used to go out though, didn't they? Maybe the circumstances when they broke up weren't normal, and that's why Sirius is still pining for her…" Damaris trailed off thoughtfully. 

"But he knows that Chase doesn't like him anymore!" Rhiannon half-shouted, and this time, Madame Pince had had enough; she stalked straight toward them, white with fury, and screamed, "OUT! _OUT!!! I WILL NOT HAVE IMPUDENT STUDENTS DISTURBING THE PEACE! THIS IS A LIBRARY, NOT A COUNSELING OFFICE!!!" And she chased them out, to the shock of several first-year students who were serenely at their work, who clearly thought that Madame Pince was no less peaceful in her own library than the two other girls._

Damaris raced through the library doors, half-dragging Rhiannon behind her, as she was too preoccupied with post-breakup woes. She stopped running only when they were a safe distance away from the library, and that mad librarian. 

Rhiannon was still muttering to herself about the irrationality of Sirius still being in love with his ex-girlfriend and the possible bad qualities of said ex. "She must think she's oh-so-perfect, the cynical—"

"I think she's rather nice," Damaris said quietly, effectively cutting short Rhiannon's tirade. She hated when Rhiannon got all angry like this, she was usually so cheerful and carefree.

Rhiannon looked utterly shocked. "What did you say?"

"I think she's OK. She was the one who saw me kissing James and she promised James not to tell anyone and let him sort it all out for himself. She did it out of honor to Lily, who deserved to know it from James and not from anyone else, and to give James time to sort it all out. She got into a fight with Lily because of it, but she never complained to me or James once, that it was our fault." 

"Well, I…" the blonde girl was at a loss for words. "Well, that doesn't explain why she blew up at Sirius when he was trying to protect her from Snape!"

"Sirius made her angry because she was Snape's friend and he said she shouldn't be. Sirius has no right to tell her who to befriend," Damaris said, gently but firmly. "That's why she got mad, but she doesn't hate him, really. I just have this feeling that she might also want Sirius back as much as Sirius wants _her back." _

Rhiannon shook her head. "How would you know all this?" she demanded. 

Damaris smiled weakly. "I listen. I haven't been able to sleep all that well for a while now, and I'm pretty sure that if your plan works, I'll get back to normal slumber patterns. I overheard Lily asking Chase if she still loved Sirius and if she was acting weird the past days because Sirius chose to be with you." 

"I expect she said yes, didn't she?" Rhiannon said sadly, now seeming a bit more reasonable after hearing Damaris' point of view. 

"She didn't say yes outright," Damaris answered slowly, "but it was clear that Lily's suspicions were right. And Lily tried to persuade her that Sirius liked her just the same, 'cause she observed that he's also been acting weird and distant after their fight."

"I guess that's why he wasn't so keen to help us with the plan," said Rhiannon, a pained expression on her face. "But, I suppose if they really do like each other…"

Damaris smiled. "Does that mean that you're over him?"

Rhiannon frowned at her, as if Damaris were being callous on purpose. "I just broke up with him an hour ago." 

"Well, there's no use moping over him, is there? If you think that he's better off with Chase?" Damaris asked. 

Rhiannon was silent for a while. "So, any luck yet on the research?" she asked, opting for a change of subject.

Damaris sighed as she remembered her previous task, but felt that it was a good idea to talk about it as it would take her friend's mind off Sirius for a while. "None whatsoever. To tell you the truth, I've been thinking a while now, and I'm starting to wonder if your plan will work. It's a little ridiculous, if you don't take it the wrong way or anything," she confessed, half of her hoping that Rhiannon wouldn't be vexed at her remark and the other half wanting her best friend to exclaim her disbelief at her for saying such a thing, if only to break her morose countenance. 

Apparently the latter was initiated. "What! How could you say that after two weeks of scouring the library for the necessary information—"

"Fruitless researching, in short," Damaris quipped. 

Rhiannon rolled her eyes. "Hey, I never said it was easy. And might I remind you that you were the one who was so raring to take action and participate in the Great Matchmaking Caper." 

"I _do_ want to fix the problem! It's just that I'm starting to think that it isn't probable to get them back together by giving them messages in little strips of paper, and we don't even know how to do it without making idiots of ourselves—"

"Do you two have any interest in telling me the password and getting inside the Tower or not?" the Fat Lady interrupted them peevishly.

The two former Zynergrand students stared at her in surprise. "Sorry, we didn't know we were here already," both said in unison. 

"I congratulate you on mastering the path to Gryffindor Tower on autopilot, then," the Fat Lady said grumpily. "Now if only you could actually say the password immediately too—"

"Honeydukes," Damaris said hastily, and the Fat Lady was forced to cut her reprimand short as she swung forward to admit them. 

"You know, that word sounds familiar…" Rhiannon said thoughtfully. 

"It's a shop in that wizarding village, Hogsmeade," Damaris explained. "I heard some younger students mentioning it once." 

"Hogsmeade…" Rhiannon muttered, instinctively glancing at the corkboard on the wall of the common room. One of the pieces of parchment pinned on the corkboard contained the date of the first Hogsmeade weekend, and information about a kind of informal fair that would be held on the same day, with many witches and wizards coming from different parts of the country to sell varying magical stuff that would attract the shopping Hogwarts students. The announcement went on to advise the students to be careful with what they bought as there would no doubt be plenty of unlicensed dealers who would attempt to sell dangerous and illegal objects as well as fake items that didn't really work.

"What are you looking at there?" Damaris inquired over her shoulder.

Rhiannon turned to glance at her and grinned. "The date and place where we'll put our plan into action."

*****  

The day of the Hogsmeade weekend drew near, and older students were starting to frequently remind each other of the things they needed to buy there.

"Yep, we're running low on Dungbombs and Filibuster Fireworks, mates…" Sirius informed the other marauders on the Friday before the Hogsmeade trip. He was starting to become a bit more upbeat since the day Chase got mad at him, probably because he would be able to restock on joke stuff and drink butterbeer to his heart's content. 

"Yes, we realize that, but whose turn is it to pay up? I did it last time," Peter added, looking around at his three friends as if daring them to force him to pay their expenses again, which was a very un-Peter-like thing to do.

"Calm down, Wormtail, and stop looking at us like we just suggested we'd rob Gringotts for fun. Contrary to your suspicions, we're not going to mug you for the gold," Sirius said, rolling his dark eyes. "Besides, if I remember correctly, it's Prongs' turn to pay out, right, Prongs?"

"Uh…right, Sirius," James said vaguely, staring at Lily who was sitting by the fireplace in the common room, talking to Celeste. Sirius shook his head and took him as a lost case and continued. 

"So, anybody else have suggestions on what to buy? We don't want to waste the opportunity to buy the essentials until the next Hogsmeade trip," Sirius bossily reminded them.

It was Remus' turn to roll his eyes. "You know very well that it's all right if we forget to purchase something, we can go to Hogsmeade any old day with the Marauder's Map!" he pointed out exasperatedly to his prank-happy friend. 

"Ah, shut up for once, Rem, I'm savoring the moment of being in charge for once, while poor Prongs is still in a catatonic state…" And at Peter's mock-solemn nods and not-quite-concealed snickers, Remus had to agree that Sirius had a point.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the room, two other people were discussing their Hogsmeade plans. 

"Right, you've got your act down pat now, haven't you, Damaris?" Rhiannon asked anxiously while writing on small strips of multicolored paper. 

Damaris looked a bit reluctant, fingering the outfit she was to change into once they got into the village. "I suppose, but don't blame me if it doesn't work or if they see right through us, I hate wearing disguises…"

"Ah, have some more faith in yourself, you were _born to do this!" Rhiannon encouraged energetically._

"If you were trying to egg me on for tomorrow, you're failing miserably." Damaris sighed. "Although if you wanted to exaggerate, you did an excellent job."

"Don't be so modest. By the time we get back to school from Hogsmeade tomorrow, James and Lily will be walking hand in hand."

*****  

"Come on, Lily, let's go!" Celeste nagged, half-pulling Lily out of her chair in the Great Hall. It was mid-breakfast time, but half the students going to Hogsmeade were already proceeding to the front doors. She suddenly remembered the way Damaris and Rhiannon had eaten at top speed before sprinting out of the Hall before all the other students. She didn't realize they were _that excited to see Hogsmeade for the first time._

"Couldn't you have let me finish my cereal first?" Lily said grumpily as she, Celeste and Chase made their way to the village ten minutes later.

"You can buy something to eat later," Celeste said dismissively. "We have a lot of stuff to do." 

"I'm surprised you want to come with us at all, seeing as you had the opportunity to spend this whole day on a date with Remus," Chase told her sister as they stepped onto the cobbled path into the village. 

"I've agreed to meet up with him later," Celeste answered breezily. "In the meantime, I'm here to help you two take your minds off your problematic love lives—or lack thereof."

"Gee, thanks. I completely forgot all about it for nine hours until you so graciously reminded me right now," Chase said sardonically, causing Lily to smirk. "Doesn't say much for your distracting capabilities, does it?"

"Don't start in on me with your cynical witticisms, dear sister," Celeste warned in a mildly irritated tone. 

"Whatever," Chase mumbled, suddenly looking sullen as she spotted the marauders trotting up to Zonko's. Although, she couldn't call James' actions as _trotting. Dragging himself as if he were heading for the gallows, more like. _

She could see Lily following her line of vision and frowning. "Let's go to the Three Broomsticks," Lily suggested, averting her eyes from the marauders.

Celeste shook her head. "Nah, it's probably too crowded with students right now. Besides, I'm sure that—others—will keep coming after a few minutes or so…"

It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what she meant by "others," so Celeste dragged the other two through shop after clothing and accessory shop throughout the next few hours. When Chase started to grumble that she had seen enough dress robes to last her a lifetime, they noticed that many witches and wizards in the village square were conjuring up tables and stools and lagging heavy trunks in various sizes. Some started to lay out their wares on the tables: twinkling stones with magical properties ("Ooh, let's go check that out later," said Celeste), an assortment of normal-looking household objects ("Probably jinxed," Celeste remarked disapprovingly), a set of potted plants with pointy teeth that seemed to want to bite passersby's hands every chance they got ("What idiot would want to buy things that would rather eat human flesh than fertilizer for nutrition?" Celeste scoffed), and items of different sizes and shapes that looked dangerous ("Honestly, the village should really inspect each merchant's goods before approving them to sell to the general public," Celeste sniffed). 

Students were starting to flock to the merchandise like pigeons; third year first timers had looks of awe in their faces, as if this were the biggest treat in all their lives. Older students also viewed some of the products with great interest, but seemed wary of the guarantees each merchant assured. 

Celeste fussed over the twinkling stones she spotted earlier and Lily and Chase strolled over to a table where the vendor had set up a display case showing small vials filled with different multicolored substances. 

"What are these supposed to be?" Chase asked the vendor, a shriveled-up old witch who looked quite scary and vindictive. 

"Poisons of varying degrees, dearies," the witch said, her thin mouth curling into an unpleasant sneer. "Perfect to lace into your foes' drinks when they're looking the other way—"

Lily looked startled. "Er, we'll just go and look at some other stuff, thanks," she said quickly, dragging away Chase, whose hand was halfway into her pocket to reach for her money bag.

"What? I was going to buy some to dump into Professor Ridgewood's goblet at dinner…" Chase said in an attempt for explanation as Lily glared at her. 

The marauders were at the other end of the series of tables. Sirius was perusing a battered old book entitled _The Art of Brewing Curse Potions_; Remus was inspecting a small ball about the same size as a Remembrall that showed what phase the moon was currently in (a crescent of silvery smoke formed one side of the ball while the remaining space held black gas of some sort); James was watching a miniature Quidditch field in a glass case with mild interest (complete with fourteen players on brooms, a referee, an audience, six goalposts, and the four Quidditch balls); Peter was being subjected to yet another merchant's exaggerated accounts of how a certain piece of merchandise was essential and valuable to be in one's pocket at all times. 

"—and that is why, young man, you should always carry a bottle of bat's eyes concealed within your robes, to protect yourself from evil—"

"Let's go over there," Sirius interrupted loudly, pointing to a spot considerably far from the merchant's stall. They scurried away past some girls who were at a stall that unusually wasn't selling anything; the two cloaked figures manning the table had hoods over their heads, their faces hidden, and they seemed to be setting up a fortune-telling booth, as there were a crystal ball and a rounded glass container that looked more like a fish bowl on the table. 

Celeste, being done with the magical stones, hustled Lily and Chase through stall after stall of magical whatnot, and even Lily had taken a page from Chase's book by complaining that they did nothing but shop that day and if Celeste wouldn't stop she'd be bankrupt before the day's end. 

"Oh, _fine, _let's just go ever there," Celeste finally said in annoyed tones, pointing at the fortune-telling booth. 

"Why are we going over there, it's just a dumb divination stall, the people manning it are probably frauds like Trelawney," Chase pointed out somewhat impatiently, as she was watching the miniature Quidditch game going on in the glass case James had been viewing earlier and didn't want to be interrupted. 

Celeste rolled her eyes at her twin. "There's hardly anyone there now, just half an hour ago students were all over it—"

"Yeah, that was before they found out that the stall owners didn't have an ounce of Seer blood in their veins," Chase muttered to Lily when Celeste wasn't looking. Nevertheless, the two followed Celeste and in minutes they were standing before a tall, silver-haired witch who was speaking to her shorter, hooded companion. It took a few moments for her to notice the trio. 

"Is there anything I can help you with, dears?" the old witch said in an unusually clear voice.

"Yes, um…what exactly do you predict here?" Celeste asked the witch brightly, while Chase rolled her eyes behind her and Lily sighed as if thinking that this would take long. 

"The subject of predictions has no limit, but for this day we offer to See into the foretelling of love, as it seems so popular with the young ones…" the witch explained, and her companion shifted in his/her seat slightly. 

This resulted to different reactions; Lily suddenly took on a sorrowful expression and looked away, Chase appeared cross and Celeste glanced over at the previous two apprehensively. "Well… Lil, Chase, you willing to try it out?" 

"No," Chase said automatically, but Lily, with typical feminine curiosity, said hesitantly, "I…well, sure…" 

Celeste's eyes lit up. "Great! And you too, Chase, nobody gets left out here…" So Chase, seeing as there was no way out of yet another one of her twin's nags, reluctantly went nearer and sighed. 

"How much?" asked Celeste, glancing warily at Chase as if daring her to say that she wouldn't spend a Knut of her money for ridiculous foretelling. 

The elderly witch gazed at them for a long time before saying, "It seems to me that two of you are troubled... if it's any consolation to the heartaches you may be feeling, your predictions are…how do you say it? On the house…" Lily and Celeste exchanged glances, both perhaps thinking that maybe the old lady wasn't too much of a fake after all. Chase said nothing of the remark, looking instead at the glass bowl beside the crystal ball. It was full of strips of parchment in varying colors, and there were flowery writings on each one. 

"What's that for?" she asked, pointing at the glass bowl. 

The hooded person beside the witch spoke. "Something for the customers to ponder after they leave our stall." The voice was unmistakably that of a woman's, a voice that sounded as mysterious as the person who owned it. "Would you like us to do palmistry first or See into the orb?" she inquired in the same quiet but commanding tone.

"Er…palmistry, I guess…" Celeste replied, looking a bit creeped out by the woman. It was a strange and perplexing experience; the two "Seers" were completely accurate in telling the current state of their love lives: the hooded witch told Celeste that her relationship was going well, but in Lily's and Chase's cases she stated that she sensed some hostility and doubt involved. 

The silver-haired witch then concluded that Lily would be experiencing better changes in the near future but had to proceed to it with caution, and that Chase would clear up her own problems but had to be wary of past wounds that could possibly affect her relationship if she didn't try to put them behind her. 

"What about me?" Celeste asked eagerly, now fully convinced that she was looking at genuine Seers. 

The tall witch gave her a small smile. "We believe that you are getting on well enough," she responded, nodding slightly to her partner. "Before you leave, please take something from the glass bowl…we find them very helpful to all the people who come to us, seeking for counsel on these matters…" She gestured, with a wizened hand, at the bowl that Chase had asked about earlier. Lily and Celeste took a strip of paper at once, but Chase was still reluctant as she put her hand into the bowl and extracted a blood red piece of parchment. 

"Fair fortune be yours, my dears..." the witch said before the three of them walked away, oddly silent for a few moments.

"What does yours say?" Celeste asked Lily, who had started to unroll her strip of parchment. "Mine says, _'Love is making the one you love happy, even if it means sacrificing your own happiness…'_ Makes sense, I think…" 

Lily read the message on her parchment under the light of the setting sun. _Better to lose your pride to the one you love, than to lose the one you love because of pride. She stood straight, staring wide-eyed at the message, and glanced back at where the two Seers' booth had been. But it was gone. The two witches were nowhere in sight. _

Chase glanced quizzically at Lily at her reaction before reading her own message. She skimmed her eyes over it and raised her eyebrows. _Love is one damned fool after another. _

It was as if the piece of parchment sensed the predicament they were in. 

"Well? What did you two read? Why do you look so surprised?" Celeste asked again, annoyed at their lack of response. Lily and Chase looked at each other before glancing back t their parchments, and both looked even more surprised as the messages changed before their eyes and formed another.

_To err is human, to forgive, divine._

*****  

"Good job, Di," Rhiannon said with a grin, slapping her friend on the back lightly. Damaris had her face scrunched in concentration, and in seconds her silvery curls reverted back to straight vandyke brown, her facial features went back to looking like a 15-year-old, and she visibly shrank a few inches back to her normal height. 

"I hate doing that," Damaris said, making a face at her friend.

Rhiannon rolled her eyes. "Jeez, look at you, all ungrateful… If I were a Metamorphmagus, I'd use my talent every opportunity I get… Anyway, who knew that a girl from a long line of Metamorphmagi would suck at Transfiguration? That must be why your mum arranged for you to have tutoring lessons in the first place…" 

"Stop reminding me that I'm not good at Transfiguration, I already know that, thanks," Damaris said. "The only way I'd be able to pass is if being able to transform your face counts for anything in class…"

"Right. Anyway, we got through our plan perfectly, don't you think? You should remember the looks on their faces when we told them about their love problems, they must've thought we were real Seers…" Rhiannon said, cracking up. 

Damaris shrugged. "I don't know why you were in such a hurry to pack up after they left though."

"'Course we had to do it, it's part of the mysterious fortuneteller act…disappear before they take a second glance, you know." Rhiannon dug out the glass bowl that she had thrown pell-mell along with the other divining items into the trunk. 

"Yes, I do know, I was just wondering why you quit the act before James stopped by our booth—"

Rhiannon's slapped a hand to her forehead. "Oh, _damn, _I forgot all about that part!" she exclaimed, forgetting that the bowl she was holding was made of glass and hurling it to the ground in frustration. As was expected, it broke, and the multicolored strips of paper in it were blown away by the cool night air.

"I don't think destroying our props is going to remedy the situation, Rhi…" Damaris said, watching the pieces of parchment float away in different directions towards the crowd of wizard-fair shoppers.

Busy with muttering incoherent profanities under her breath, Rhiannon ignored her friend. 

"I mean, I _did tell you just days ago… I don't really know how much help a few scribbled love quotes can do to mend James and Lily's—and maybe Sirius and Chase's too—broken relationships," Damaris continued, just as Rhiannon decided to be content with saying "Stupid, stupid, stupid…" instead of cuss words. _

"But it _does help," the self-reproaching blonde said suddenly. "Apologies…these don't seem to work in their case. Having other people telling them to do what's right is just useless; they've got to figure it out for themselves, and the quotes are enough to make them ponder that for a while."_

"First a fortuneteller, now a psychiatrist… You really don't run out of possible career options and ways of exercising your 'expertise' on them, do you?" Damaris said resignedly.

"I sure don't," said Rhiannon in a lighter tone, seemingly forgetting her previous foul mood. Then her face scrunched up into a look of confusion and she said, "Erm…what's a psychotist again?"

Damaris shook her head. "_Psychiatrist_. It's a Muggle professional that specializes on human behavior."

Rhiannon nodded. "Uh-huh. C'mon, let's get back to the school and think up another way to make James read one of those quote-thingies…"

"Sure…if I remember where I put the sheet of paper where I compiled all of them, I think I threw it out…" Damaris replied sheepishly.

Rhiannon's "_WHAT!!!" reached the far ears of the students on the other side of the quadrangle. Which happened to be the same place that a few pieces of their parchment had chosen to land in. _

A student bent over to pick up a silver piece of parchment with gold writing on it. Somebody appeared behind him, watching.

"Whatcha doing, Prongs? Think Lily'd forgive you if you start a save-the-trees-by-recycling campaign?" Sirius commented in an attempt to force some levity into his friend's dark mood. 

James didn't answer; in fact, he hadn't taken in a word of what Sirius had said, as he was too busy staring at the thing he picked up…and what was written on it.

_If you love something, you'll set it free. If it comes back to you, it is yours. If it does not, it never was... _He glanced at the people milling about, as if one of them had been responsible for dropping the parchment he held before him. But there was nobody who looked like they would be the type to carry strips of paper with love quotes on them inside their pockets. 

"James! You coming?" Remus called from a few feet away. James stood up and pocketed the strip of paper.

It looked like Rhiannon had executed her plan as she had hoped after all. 

***** 

A/N – *on the verge of ripping her hair out* please don't kill me if this chappie was so lame… and it was getting so long, I just had to end it (and my agony over it), even though I said this was going to be the last chapter… I won't be surprised if *mutters dark and pessimistic thoughts under her breath*.  I haven't exactly finished writing the ending yet, though I've got a general idea… oh well, that's what I get for opting the plan-things-as-you-go-along tack in writing…and for not having a beta-reader… 


	10. What Binds Us

**Complications**

**By Dimantrien**

**Chapter 10: What Binds Us**

"Will you two ever tell me what was in those parchments that made you so awfully quiet for the past thirty minutes?" Celeste asked, already at the end of her patience. 

Chase snapped out of her trance-like state and stared at her twin as if she just noticed that she was there. "Well…you know what that lady said, that they would contain something we were to ponder over," she answered. She had always believed that Divination was just a bunch of riffraff, even if she did take the subject, but for the past few minutes she realized that she had been seriously considering forgiving Sirius and getting back together with him. _Although I'm sure he's happy with Rhiannon now, and must think that I'm an insufferable, high-maintenance witch,_ she thought gloomily. 

"That doesn't mean that you have to keep its contents secret," Celeste argued, turning to Lily instead. 

Lily rolled her eyes. "If you want it so badly, here," she said irritably, at the same time Chase shoved her own parchment into her sister's hands. Celeste quickly read the curly handwriting. 

"Hey! You two got the same messages. See, _'To err is human, to forgive, divine.' _It means that you've both got to let James and Sirius apologize! And maybe it's saying you ought to forgive Damaris too, Lil!" Celeste said excitedly.

Lily snorted. "James is one thing, but I doubt I'm going to be having an affair with Damaris anytime soon, thanks." Chase snickered while Celeste merely looked annoyed.

"I didn't mean it _that way, and you know it," she huffed. "All I'm saying is, those Seers—or whatever they were—seem to know their stuff and that it wouldn't hurt to follow their advice. And I should remind you that they didn't know your problems in the first place, which means they're not frauds as all their predictions hit the nail on the head—"_

"We know, Celes," Chase interrupted exasperatedly. "Why do you think we've been quiet all this time? But I still think there's something fishy going on. I know there are real Seers, but those two sure didn't look like they were—"

It was Celeste's turn to snort. "And you're basing your observations on what? How many Seers have you met in your life? The only person I can think of that's remotely related to Divination is Trelawney, and I'm sure _she's _no Seer…and I know you think so too." 

"What _I think is that it's not a good idea to initiate bought advice," Chase said defensively. "Especially from anonymous people who disappear once you take a second glance."_

"You said it yourself. Just a second ago you were considering their counsel," Celeste retorted.

Lily sighed. "We're here, guys," she pointed out, gesturing at the front steps to the castle. 

The two sisters continued to bicker until they reached their seats in the Great Hall. 

"Well, I really think you should—"

"I don't _care what you think—"_

"You guys…" Lily said in a louder voice, noticing that a few people were starting to look up from their plates and stare at the twins.

"—lay off me just this once…"

"I would if you knew how to make level-headed decisions—"

"I'm going to talk to James." 

The two brunettes stopped in mid-sentence and turned to stare at her, their shocked faces identical to the last detail, both at a loss of words.

Lily almost smiled. _That shut them up. _

*****  

The four marauders trudged up the front steps leading to the entrance of Hogwarts Castle in silence. Even Sirius didn't have anything to say, but then again, he hadn't been living up to his garrulous personality for the few previous days. 

One could say that he had already started to recover during their trip to Hogsmeade, and had lightened up a little, but his depressed mood started to sink into him once more now they were back to the school, where all their problems started. And it didn't help that James had become awfully quiet (not that he wasn't already) ever since he read whatever was in the silver strip of paper he had picked up at the wizard fair.  

It was Peter who broke the silence, as they stepped into the spacious entrance hall. "What did Madame Rosmerta put into the butterbeer that you three drank that made you so quiet?" he piped up, rolling his eyes for emphasis.

"Well, if it would do anything for your abysmal memory, I'd like to remind you that you too drank butterbeer in the exact same pub as we did, and you consumed roughly three mugs of it, if I remember correctly," Remus not-quite-answered pleasantly, looking pointedly at the sheepish shorter boy. "And I must say you weren't any more loquacious than Sirius on a Reticence Curse." 

"Hey…" Sirius started in a disapproving tone. 

Remus looked at him innocently. "What? I didn't exactly say that you're so talkative that we need a Reticence Curse at the ready to shut you up, I was merely using a metaphor so as to emphasize Peter's silence in the simplest way for him to understand." 

Peter had started to laugh at Remus' second sentence, and went on sniggering for a few moments after the werewolf had stopped talking, when the meaning of Remus' last statement finally sank in. "Hey!" he shouted in protest, glaring at Remus, who had already ran ahead of them and was laughing his head off. Sirius was already running after him, but Remus' advantage of being part wolf helped him in running at just the right speed to be out of his friend's reach.

Sirius stopped chasing him and looked to James helplessly for backup. "Prongs, don't just stand there, help me catch the insufferable wiseass—"

"—love something, you'll set it free…" James was mumbling under his breath. 

"What are you saying, mate?" Sirius asked, throwing James the look that the sane give the crazy. Of course, Sirius wasn't what most people would call _entirely_ sane, so the dog-Animagus' expression didn't have the desired effect he had originally intended. Remus, too, had stopped running, and slowed down in front of James, who still looked a bit zombie-like. 

Peter called to them from the doorway into the Great Hall. "Are you guys coming or what?" 

Remus, who was looking quizzically at James, glanced at him. "Oh yeah…sorry 'bout that, Wormtail," he said, and the two of them headed into the Hall. 

Sirius watched them leave and turned back to James, hooking an arm over his friend's shoulder and speaking in mock-confidential tones. "Prongs, as your best mate, it is my duty to inform you that you have officially cracked." 

James said nothing and shrugged him off, following Peter and Remus' trail into the Great Hall. 

He had left his best friend staring after him. James must be really out of it if he ignored Sirius' usual attempts to annoy the hell out of him. Even in the previous days, James had managed halfhearted retorts to his best friend and the other marauders when they teased him about his lackluster attitude. Sirius shook his head. _Man, Prongs is really losing it. I've gotta make a mental note to beg Lily to take him back; his zombie act might eventually become permanent_… _His eyes widened in horror at the prospect. But he was just a teensy bit curious…_

Before James' back completely disappeared from his best friend's view, Sirius whipped out his wand. _"Accio parchment!"__ The silver strip of paper shot out of James' robe pocket and into Sirius' waiting palm. James didn't even notice. _

Sirius started to read the words written in golden ink. 

*****  

Celeste sighed, picking at the olives on her half-finished plate of food. Lily and Chase had left a few minutes ago. After her redheaded friend's proclamation, she and Chase had lost their mood to fight. Chase had, predictably, raised an eyebrow at their friend's sudden change of heart (after a few moments of stunned silence, of course) and went off, muttering something about unfinished Charms homework. Celeste smiled. She knew that her twin had gone off somewhere thinking about what Lily had said, and whether she should do the same. 

She supposed Chase wasn't really that hard to figure out, after all. 

And speaking of Lily and Chase's problems…

Remus and Peter arrived, taking a seat on either side of her, and trailing behind them were James and Sirius, who both looked…a little bit lost in their own world. 

"Hey, Celes," Remus greeted, and Peter, whose mouth was already filled with food, nodded in way of saying hi also. 

Peter swallowed just as James and Sirius sat down across them. He glanced at them before turning to Remus and saying, "You know, I think we better keep away from these guys for a while; James' zombie-itis must be contagious." 

Remus laughed, and explained to Celeste how James had been acting weird ever since they left Hogsmeade. 

"—and I reckon Peter might be on to something when he suggested that Madame Rosmerta put something into their drinks, she might be getting revenge, you know, after Prongs and Padfoot enchanted their empty mugs last time so they'd make whoever touched the handles get shriveled-up hands…" 

Celeste smiled at the normally hyperactive duo. "Oh, come on, guys, cheer up a little. Things'll get better soon, I'm sure." Her sympathetic grin turned smug as she recalled the incident with those maybe-Seers. "_Real _soon." 

And Peter and Remus had looked at her oddly, not knowing what she meant. 

On the other side of the Gryffindor table, Rhiannon and Damaris had just settled down to dinner, Damaris eating with much gusto, and Rhiannon moving her food around in her plate in a dejected manner. 

"What's wrong, Rhi? The food's good," Damaris pointed out as she took second helpings of steak, which was a very un-Damaris-like thing to do.

"Sure it tastes good to you, we just ran into Lily and she was all smiley and said that she forgives you," Rhiannon said, recalling how Lily had met them at the entrance hall and said in apologetic tones that she shouldn't have been so strongly against Damaris and hadn't considered her side of the story. All in all she had put Damaris in a happier mood than she had in days. 

Rhiannon was, on the other hand, still brooding over breaking up with Sirius and acting incredulous at herself for _encouraging _Chase Tarlise to get back together with him. She sighed and put her head in her hands. Life was so unfair…

A hand tapped her on the shoulder, and she looked up and met Damaris' green eyes. "Hey," the brunette said, smiling at her. "Love is making the one you love happy, even if it means sacrificing your own happiness, right?" 

Rhiannon rolled her eyes. "Thanks for trying, but that didn't exactly make me feel any better." 

Damaris shrugged. "Come on, there are other guys in the world aside from Sirius Black. It's better this way, you know. Next year we're going back to the newly reconstructed Zynergrand Academy and that'll be way far from here. Everybody knows that long distance relationships never work." Rhiannon scowled at her. "Most of them, anyway," she said hastily. 

"I suppose you're right," Rhiannon said, though her words sounded forced. Damaris just smiled sympathetically at her before turning back to her dinner.

Her would-be retort still stuck in her mind. _Yeah, but didn't somebody say that absence makes the heart grow fonder? _

The blonde girl sighed. Her plan had worked flawlessly, but, self-contradicting her thoughts the previous day, she felt that a well-placed love quote didn't really solve anything. 

Or maybe it was just her.

Life was seriously unfair.

*****  

James Potter stood against a beech tree in the vast Hogwarts grounds, ignoring the wind that tousled his already untidy hair. He clearly remembered Chase's urgent words when she had pulled him aside after the last class of the day, Transfiguration. 

_"Meet me at the beech tree beside the lake at __5:00__." _

But before he could ask her _why he was supposed to meet her, she had already disappeared in the crowd of students trudging through the Transfiguration corridor. It seemed a little too strange, so strange, in fact, that he had suddenly lost his depressed state with a bit of curiosity and suspicion. _

His wariness grew when Sirius told him that Lily had done the exact same thing, except their meeting place was at one of the school towers. He frowned. If Lily and Chase thought it would be better if they _exchanged _boyfriends…

His ears pricked up as he heard the sound of crunching leaves behind him. He turned around and saw red hair, and startlingly bright emerald eyes. And a smile. 

His depression, he was certain, had completely left him. 

*****  

No sound came from Sirius' hurried footsteps up one of the more insignificant towers of Hogwarts Castle. He was positive that the place hadn't been entered in years, as there was a thick layer of dust on each step of the spiraling staircase, except for a single set of fresh footprints leading up to the tower. Had to be Lily's. The footprints were small, and Lily was known for being punctual. Of course, _he_ wasn't, and that was why he was running up the steps as if his butt were on fire. Lily was his friend, but she was a prefect. And prefects had clean, spotless records, which meant that they were absolute angels in the punctuality department too. Of course, since Lily was his friend, she _might forgive him if he were about, say, five to ten minutes late, right? _

Yes, he was positive she would. The problem was, he was a little bit over that reasonable arriving time of 5:10… OK, fine he was forty minutes late, but it wasn't his fault; he hadn't known that Professor McGonagall would award him with thirty minutes of telling-off when he _accidentally _transfigured his beach ball into, not an armadillo, but ten boa constrictors… 

So he silently thought of what to put in his last will and testament which he would have to beg Lily to write for him before she unleashed her wrath over him… 

He braced himself as he reached the last step on the landing, leading to a high oak door. He pushed it open, prepared for the worst. 

"Lily, I'm really, _really so—"_

He stopped midsentence as he looked at the person sitting on the windowsill. Chase jumped down and brushed the dust off her school robes. "Not the person you were expecting?" she said. There was no smirk on her face, and if he looked really closely, he'd see that she almost looked apologetic, her head bowed slightly, her right foot making small circles on the dusty floor. 

Sirius didn't know which made him more relieved (and happier): the fact that Chase was finally talking to him, or the fact that he wasn't in the face of near-death punishment for being more than fashionably late. 

*****  

The fire in the Gryffindor common room crackled merrily. 

"D'you think everything will work out now?" Remus asked Celeste, who had just retold the whole story, fortunetellers and all, in the span of five minutes. 

Celeste smiled. "That's a rhetorical question, love. What could possibly go wrong?"

Remus shrugged. "Well, I suppose 'happy ending' in their cases translate to 'mega-snogging session'…" he said mock-thoughtfully.

"Your point being…?"  Celeste asked, raising a perfectly-plucked brow. 

"The worst thing that could happen is that they stay wherever they are until past curfew because they'll be rather _busy…_and since neither pair has James' invisibility cloak, they'll have to figure out some creative way to get past the caretaker and roaming teachers _without _getting caught… Then again, they'll probably be so preoccupied with their newfound happiness that they'll get caught anyway…" 

Celeste rolled her eyes. "You think too much."

Remus smirked. "So, you wanna go crash their fun before they get too carried away?" 

"You know, you're being _really insensitive…can't you give them their much-needed privacy?"  _

There was a pause. "I'm just going to give them as much privacy as they've given us." 

Another pause. Celeste stood up abruptly after a moment. "Let's get to it."

"Give them another hour. They're probably still in the I'm-so-sorry-will-you-ever-forgive-me stage…" Remus said with a laugh.

"And after that is the It's-OK-I'll-always-love-you part…then it's happily ever after," Celeste added.

The werewolf shook his head. "No, that won't happen because at a quarter to seven we'll be there to intrude in their little love fests…" He smiled. "There's no such thing as the perfect ending."

*****  

Everything was silent; only the wind entering the open window made the soft whistle of sound. The two figures facing each other on opposite ends of the room were stationary, before one of them finally had the initiative to speak. 

"Well? Aren't you going to yell at me, or tell me that I'm an ungrateful bitch for not appreciating everything you did for me and for ignoring you completely because of something that wasn't even your fault?" Chase blurted out.

Sirius smiled weakly. "Why would I do that?" 

Chase slumped against the wall, crossing her arms over her chest. "Gee, I dunno. Because I deserve it?" she replied with a hint of exasperation and sarcasm in her voice. 

It appeared that Sirius had nothing to say, except to stutter a nervous "er" or "um" on occasion. It was very un-Sirius-like behavior; if the other marauders were there they might have viewed a rare and amusing show.

Chase sighed, shaking her head as if trying to clear what she'd just said. "Sorry about that," she mumbled, saying something under her breath that Sirius didn't quite catch. "Look, I'm sorry, okay? For everything. For yelling at you like that when all you had were good intentions, for ignoring you all this time, for not telling you sooner that I befriended your mortal enemy so that I could make you understand. For all the other idiotic things I did that made you mad."  

"I was never mad at you," Sirius said, finding his voice. "And you don't have to apologize. It's not your fault—"

"Everything's my fault, and you know it," Chase interjected. "Stop trying to make me look like the innocent one."

Sirius smiled crookedly, walking closer. "Fine. It _was your fault; now you have to grovel at my feet until I grant you my forgiveness." His statement brought an end to the awkwardness of the situation and at the same time lightened their moods. _

Chases laughed. "I don't think I can go _that _far… I do have my pride." 

Sirius raised an eyebrow mock-skeptically. "Isn't apologizing supposed to be all about laying down your pride? I won't listen to anything else you have to say until you drop down there and do fifty!" Chase looked at him blankly. "Uh, never mind, it was just a line in a Martin Miggs issue…" 

"Does this mean that you forgive me?" Chase asked in a doubtful tone. 

"Well, yeah, I suppose. I mean, I'm just glad that we're talking now… Wouldn't want to ruin that, would I?" 

"I guess so," Chase said slowly before looking out the window at the darkening sky. "You're letting me off easy, you know. You're supposed to get mad, and tell me that I'm a worthless friend, and try to get back at me by doing thoughtful things like putting hair dye in my shampoo or filling my sock drawer with cockroaches." 

"Do you want me to? I will, if it'll make you feel better," Sirius said with a smirk. 

Chase just smiled, and it occurred to him how much he missed that. It had been almost a year since he saw that smile, because after they broke up she never graced him with that expression ever again. Oh, she would flash him her trademark smirk, but there was a major difference. Smiling made her seem so…open and pleasant, while smirking gave him the impression that she was putting up a sarcastic front to defend herself from being vulnerable to others. She never really liked showing her true emotions. Not until now. 

"Even though I do deserve it, I must admit that I'm about as fond of roaches as my sister is…so… thanks, but no thanks." They stood there for a while, staring at each other, before Chase again broke the silence. "So…how've you been?" she asked in a polite—but slightly strained—voice.

Sirius shifted uncomfortably; he definitely didn't have to tell her that he'd spent the last few days pining for her, and he suddenly remembered his breakup with Rhiannon, for which he was beyond guilty. He didn't know why…before Chase, he hadn't really minded whether he was hurting a girl's feelings or not when he dumped her. 

But maybe he did know why. His 'player' reputation started to die down last year, when he had started going out with Chase. She had changed him, somehow, making him more sensitive to a woman's feelings, compelling him to break his one-week flings. She was the only girl that he got serious with, and after he lost her, other girls didn't matter as much anymore. 

"…Sirius?" Chase asked tentatively when he didn't respond. He snapped out of his trance at the sound of his name. 

"Uh…right, I've been fine, I mean, everything's fine this week, no problem," he said in a rush. "And you?" he added, evading further details on his answer. 

Chase's smile faded slightly. "Everything's been going well for me, too." 

"Yeah, you sure look it," Sirius pointed out half-sardonically, noticing her change in mood. 

Chase rolled her eyes. "I wasn't finished. Everything _had _been going well—if it weren't for the fact that I was worried sick of how mad you'd be at me when I planned to talk to you!" She seemed to realize that she had let something slip; her blue eyes widened slightly and she shut her mouth, saying no more. 

A wide grin spread on Sirius' face. "_You_, worried sick? That's _priceless…" he teased, imagining Miss Indifference wringing her hands out in anxiety over a talk with him. _

"Oh, shut up," Chase said with a scowl. "You don't know how hard it is to face the prospect of showing up to meet an insane person in a rage at you, inside a secluded tower, _alone…" _

"Insane? Oh, how _hurtful you are…" Sirius said melodramatically, pretending to look wounded. His antics elicited a laugh from the brunette. _

"It's so nice to see you back to your stupid self," she said in between giggles. 

"Hey, you're looking at one of the smartest, most brilliant students in this school," Sirius protested, gesturing at himself in a grand manner. "You can't call a genius _stupid."_

"Genius? I wouldn't say _that… _Although if you were, that'd explain everything…"

"You mean, explain my exceptional accomplishments in academics?" 

"No, the proof that there really is a thin line between genius and insanity." 

Sirius attempted to look cross, but gave in to laughter as well. He hadn't felt this light in ages. 

It was good to be back. Back to having an easy, constantly-banter-filled relationship with Chase, the way they used to. Well, maybe not quite. She wasn't his anymore. She had moved on. Or had she?

_He _had tried to move on. And it hadn't worked. Maybe, somewhere inside her, she hadn't either. Maybe there was still hope. 

Maybe he could make things really go back to the way they used to. 

His laughter subsided, and gradually his companion's did too. "You know, it's nice that things are back to normal again. I feel like a heavy burden's been lifted from my shoulders," he said honestly, running a hand through his hair. "I really missed you."

For a moment he thought he saw a look of surprise on Chase's face, but then she smiled in a melancholy kind of way. "Yeah, me too," she said softly. She turned her back on him and rested her hands on the windowsill, staring up at the darkening sky. 

Sirius was baffled at her abrupt change in mood. First she was laughing, and then she suddenly looked so sad. The picture of her standing there, looking at the setting sun, reminded him fleetingly of one of those romance novels where the girl contemplates her case of unrequited love. It rang a bell…

And it then occurred to him that Chase didn't know yet that he had broken up with Rhiannon. Did she still…?

She might. And that possibility, likely or not, gave him all the hope he needed. 

*****  

Lily stood against the beech tree, all the while staring at the boy before her. She hadn't realized that she had missed him this much. Or maybe she did, it was just that she didn't want to accept it. But maybe it was time to put things in the past. 

She sat down on the grass, aware that James hadn't moved in the last minute that they had been in each other's presence. She sighed, just wanting to get this all over with. Gods, she really wanted him back. And she wanted to know the truth. Not a twisted story, but the real one. "You have ten minutes to explain and convince me," she spoke firmly, fixing her ex-boyfriend with a hard stare. She _did want him back. Badly. But she wasn't going to make it easier for him by running straight into his arms as if nothing had happened. _

She deserved the truth. And she wasn't going to leave until she got it. 

James sat down Indian style in front of her, looking relieved. Well, that was a bit of an understatement. He looked like he couldn't believe that the gods had granted him this miracle. Lily was almost inclined to laugh, but she tried to keep her expression set as stone.   

"Well, it's like this…" James started to say, and after that he ran through a detailed description of how he had just been tutoring Damaris on Professor McGonagall's orders, how he hadn't seen anything coming when Damaris suddenly kissed him, and how he barely had time to react when Chase had suddenly barged in, all kinds of assumptions running through her head at the sight of them. "And I had no idea that she would do that, honest," he concluded, staring at Lily as if begging her to believe him because his life depended on it. "I _would have pushed her away at that second, but Chase did that for me already."_

Lily raised her eyebrows. "Chase pushed you two away from each other?"

"No! I meant I was going to push her away at the exact moment that Chase came in, so naturally Chase thought that I was cheating on you—"

"Then why did you break up with me?" Lily challenged. "You didn't exactly give me a rational answer the first time I asked that question."

James looked more strained than ever. "I know I sounded stupid when I said I was doing what was best for everybody. Remember when I said that Damaris had a serious problem, or something? I don't know what it is, but it must be something that's got to do with her lack of self-confidence…I reckon she must be handling a lot of high expectations from her family, like McGonagall hinted to me." (A/N – Damaris is a Metamorphmagus, remember? Her family expected a lot from her because she was supposed to excel at Transfiguration like they did…)

"Well, that's no reason to dump me," Lily objected, a look of irritation on her face. 

"No, it isn't," James replied quietly, looking like the perfect picture of guilt. "I've done a lot of dumb things in my life, and this is one of the worst of them." Lily glared pointedly at him. "All right, the _worst_ of them. What I just want to know is…can…will…will you forgive me?" 

Lily stared at him. He really did look desperate…and remorseful. She couldn't imagine the fourteen-year-old James having that expression; in their previous year he wouldn't be caught dead wearing such a helpless and pitiful countenance. James Potter had a lot of pride, and though he wasn't what you would call completely arrogant he still refused to give in to other people's demands. He was stubborn, and he hated being the lower person, the one with no power in a situation. 

But here he was, doing something he never wanted to do: show his weaker side; put all his pride down for another person. He was, in a word, vulnerable. And he did it for Lily. He did it for guilt, for forgiveness, and for a second chance.

Did he deserve it? 

_Yes, _Lily decided as James continued to look at her pleadingly. If he could lay down his pride, then why couldn't she? "I forgive you," she answered, and she never knew that those three little words could do so much for a person: James' eyes lit up, heck, everything about him suddenly looked much more radiant, and his expression transformed from despondent to euphoric. 

He lunged forward and hugged Lily tightly, catching her by surprise. "Thank you," he whispered in her ear before pulling away. He smiled his heart-stopping smile and brushed away the tears that were forming at his eyes. Lily smiled back. James, at the verge of crying? It was a very rare sight; she was quite sure that not even his best friends had ever seen him so…humbled. "I love you, Lily," he said before pulling her close and locking his lips with hers. It was a sweet and gentle kiss, a kiss that both wished could last forever. But, of course, it didn't.

"I love you too," Lily echoed after they broke away. She never felt lighter in days. 

_I believe in Karma what you give is what you get returned  
I believe you can't appreciate real love until you've been burned  
I believe the grass is no more greener on the other side  
I believe you don't know what you've got until you say goodbye*_

Love wasn't perfect. Love came with a lot of sacrifice and pain, but that was what made it all the more wonderful. To know that the one you love had limitations that you had to accept, and vice versa. To know that even though both had misgivings, they had to shape those doubts into trust, in a way that would bring them closer together. Love wasn't perfect. 

And that was what made it all the more special. 

*****

Meanwhile, two people were under a 'borrowed' invisibility cloak, heading for the beech tree where two other people had chosen as a meeting place. They had decided to go there first, because it was tiresome to climb the steps to a certain tower, which was their alternative destination. 

And on the other side of the castle, two other people were coming down the said steps, both too amazed by the previous events to have much of an appetite for dinner. They decided to head for a particular tree beside the lake. 

They were both in a blissful mood because of the conversation they had earlier. Both secretly longed for the other, but felt that it wasn't the time to admit so. They weren't holding hands. But they were content all the same. 

The sun was setting when they went through the front doors. They found it strange that it was already open, as if there was somebody who, like them, decided to take a stroll around the grounds at a quarter to seven. It was unusual that the sun was setting this late. But there were a lot of unusual things that happened in a magical place, in a magical time. The time of forgiveness. The time of renewal. 

_I believe the sun should never set upon an argument  
I believe we place our happiness in other people's hands  
I believe that junk food tastes so good because it's bad for you  
I believe your parents did the best job they knew how to do  
I believe that beauty magazines promote low self-esteem_

_I believe I'm loved when I'm completely by myself alone*  
  
_

All four wanderers wondered what would happen at their destination. The pair that was already at that place had no idea that the tree they were sitting under would be a bit crowded soon. But all six of them, under the red-and-orange-stained sky, felt the head rush caused by a certain force that at that moment was at the zenith of their hearts, an intangible thing that kept them as they were, that sometimes failed them, that at the moment enveloped them with its ties: love. 

_I believe you can't control or choose your sexuality  
I believe that trust is more important than monogamy  
I believe your most attractive features are your heart and soul  
I believe that family is worth more than money or gold  
I believe the struggle for financial freedom is unfair  
I believe the only ones who disagree are millionaires_

_I believe forgiveness is the key to your unhappiness  
I believe that wedded bliss negates the need to be undressed  
I believe that God does not endorse TV evangelists  
I believe in love surviving death into eternity  
  
_

_I believe in Karma what you give is what you get returned  
I believe you can't appreciate real love until you've been burned  
I believe the grass is no more greener on the other side  
I believe you don't know what you've got until you say goodbye_

**The End**

*****

On some secluded part of Hogwarts castle…

"Hello? Hey, is anybody there? Moony? Padfoot? Prongs?" 

Peter Pettigrew wandered the dark halls, feeling the creeping sense of foreboding. He hated the dark. It made him feel all cold and clammy. It made him feel…oddly left out.

He believed he was lost. 

"Where _is everybody?"_

*****  

**A/N – **Sorry for adding in that part above ^_^ Couldn't resist… Yes, and it wasn't supposed to end at the part where they were going to meet each other, but I thought it was a good place to end the story…

Thank you to everyone who supported this fan fiction. It isn't one of my better works, I know, and I'm glad that there are people who appreciated it. Well, this is the last chapter, and I gave it my best shot, so…some feedback wouldn't hurt, right? 

* The song _Affirmation was sung by Savage Garden. The bits of lyrics in the fic were not encoded in the right order. Don't own it, don't sue. _


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